


Out of Sight, Out of Mind

by AddisonAddek



Category: Grey's Anatomy
Genre: Abuse, Abuse of Authority, Addek baby, Addison Incarcerated, Alternate Universe - Prison, Angst, Anxiety, Crime, Denial, Depression, Drama, Drug Dealing, F/F, F/M, Fights, Fist Fights, Gay for the stay, Gen, Girls Kissing, Harassment, Murder, Panic Attack, Pregnant, Prison Politics, Prison life, Turned Out, Violence, addek, alternative universe, incarcerated
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-19
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-04 20:02:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 62,756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25282048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AddisonAddek/pseuds/AddisonAddek
Summary: An Addek FanFiction. Alternative Universe.Addison Montgomery is a survivor. She survived all that was bestowed upon out on the free world. So, she can survive this; she can survive prison. Even a Connecticut Princess like herself. She has to because she’s not only looking out for herself anymore — now that she’s pregnant.Addek endgame.Addison/Derek#Addek #AddekBaby #AddisonIncarcerated
Relationships: Addison Montgomery/Alex Karev, Addison Montgomery/Calliope "Callie" Torres, Addison Montgomery/Derek Shepherd, Addison Montgomery/Meredith Grey
Comments: 36
Kudos: 8





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This idea is probably far-fetched but I really really—just really wanted to write a story like this.
> 
> Before we start I would like to say that I am not a lawyer and I am not from America, so if I get my “lawyery” facts wrong, I apologise. All the laws and facts that would be in this story are from what I have read and researched online, and have tried to make sense of it in my head.
> 
> Also, I am using the current laws for this story, although it’s more like taking place in the 90s, since I can’t find much info from that period of time.
> 
> Please leave a comment.

**Out of Sight, Out of Mind**

_**Chapter One** _

_"You're not getting out. You're stuck here until they tell you that you can leave"_

* * *

_Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock._

There are no windows in prison. At least, none that she'd seen since she got here. There isn't one in her cell, there isn't one in the barrack or in this Housing Unit. And there definitely isn't one in solitary confinement.

No one has a window up there.

Not in this prison, at least.

It's also never dark here, though, as one might think otherwise. _'Lights out'_ doesn't mean lights will be turned off — no, there's always some kind of light so that the correctional officers can see them at all times and she gets it, she really does — _they're_ criminals, _they're_ dangerous, you know, whatever — but she's convinced that it's more as a form of torture.

White torture.

_Would it kill them to just dim the lights a little? Just a tad bit more so she can get some sleep once in a while._

She still remembers the last time she saw the sky as a free woman; it was setting, lightening to a weak pinky-orange hue and it looked like nothing more than watered down blood.

_Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock._

Everything aches in prison. Everything stinks sour in prison. Everything about prison is driving her to the brink of insanity.

Oh, and she's not going to say that out loud or tell anyone for that matter because then, they'll strip her naked and stick her in psych for God knows how long. She's seen it happen and most of the time, the women would come back out even crazier than they were beforehand.

Prison takes and takes until _they_ begin to lose touch with reality, until they forget what it was like because they had to adapt, evolve, become in order to survive.

The concept of time and space is nonexistent here and it's done so on purpose to mess with their minds. Like she mentioned, a form of white torture. She's like a candle; she dies a little everyday. However, now that she's in prison, it's a lot more than just a little. She has been melting steadily for some twenty-four years and five months, but the candle is much smaller now, four months into her sentence. She's basically a puddle of burning wax and a tiny wick now.

It's a hopeful sort of thing, at least in appearance. When one looks closely though, it's all shadows and smoke — in the way that shadow magnifies an object and smoke mars vision. She's the candle and it's dripping, dripping, and the wax is coagulating, coagulating on her skin like hot white scars.

On the outside, or _the streets_ , time is incredibly important. Time is commonly represented by spatial metaphors. Time is as invisible, time is untouchable, inaudible as the idea of God, and as indissolubly part of everything.

Her everyday communications used to be littered with references to time — clock time and winter time, good times and bad times, of the right time, of a time that flies and a time that takes its toll. Her experience of time was something that was always passing, moving or flowing. Not still and not silent. She lived in, and by, and was caught in time until that time she helped a friend _(she was more sister than friend)_ and was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Gaging time in prison takes practice and ... well, time to master, so to speak. She measures her day with the three meals she gets — breakfast, lunch and dinner equates to morning, afternoon and evening. Noises is also a great indicator, but it's always so fucking loud in here. Over seventy women in an enclosure, all of them talking and laughing and shouting and clanking something and someone is always bound to be too loud and rambunctious and inconsiderate _(and have led to plenty fights)_ and all of it is happening at the same time, simultaneously, all day and everyday.

Even at night, at _'lights out'_ , though a lot quieter.

_Let that image sink in for a minute._

It is bound to drive anyone over the edge.

_Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock._

All there is in prison is time and time, itself. And some people have a lot of it. But there is no clock for them to calculate and gage time — not one that is visible to them because she hears it like clockwork every night, so she knows it's here somewhere.

It exists. It taunts. It calms her nerves.

Most nights, she lulls to sleep with it in the background, too exhausted from standing up twelve hours straight at her job in laundry, minus the half an hour for waiting in line at the **chow hall** and the few minutes she gets to sit down and eat. Tonight, though, it's driving her incessantly insane and it doesn't help that the baby is insisting her to munch on ice ... or something cold and frozen.

_Where is she going to get ice? There is no 7-eleven here._

And her back aches, her feet, too, and she's so hungry she could eat a whole cow and there's nothing she can do about it.

This is what time is to her in prison.

Late night cravings where she can't do anything to satisfy them. It's not like she has Derek to go out and satisfy those cravings for her.

She needs to be present for count at specified times. She needs to be at her job assignment not a minute late. She needs to know when the phones cut off for the night. Because that's the end of the day, an indication that she would be doing this all over again tomorrow.

Sometimes when Derek comes to visit, she'd ask him for the date since it's fairly easy to lose track of it in here. She'd know the day because it'd be visitations and she doesn't have to work, which is what happens on the weekends.

 _'Day-off'._ Yes, those who have jobs do get day-offs.

Weekdays are horribly mundane and boring on a good day in prison.

_Wake up. Shower. Eat. Count. Job. Eat. Count. Job. Eat. Count. Sleep._

That's the basic rundown of her day. _Every day._ Sometimes she'd change it up a little bit with a phone call in the evenings. Or she'd be escorted to the infirmary — they used to take her to a free clinic hours away in the free world _(which is another horrible experience on it's own)_ for her _'_ _check-up'_ because the regular doctor they had was out on vacation. She uses the parenthesis because all they do is the bare minimum _(so they don't get sued because she cannot complain that they were not providing her with healthcare._ _)_ and that's pushing it.

_Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock._

Fridays are her favourite, though, mainly for the coffee cakes that they serve for breakfast, which she'd wake up for as early as four in the morning just to wait in line at chow.

She's gotten pretty good at telling time by the meals and noises and the Friday breakfast special and she doesn't mind it, she has to do it like _this_ in order to save her sanity. She had to forget all and what she knew about life on the outside and live in the present.

This is her present.

_Prison._

Because prison is like a world within a world. A forgotten world. Her life is essentially on hold while the _'real'_ world around her, for how ever long she'd be stuck in here, continues on without her.

Her family. Her Derek. Her friends. Medical school.

It seemed so ancient, a lifetime ago, when she was in medical school and on top of her class.

She used to be so good.

_Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock._

On her second week in prison, her **cellie** tells her that she's not getting out. That she is essentially stuck in here until _they_ tell her that she can leave.

_They. They. They. They._

She always has to listen to and take orders from the _'theys'_ and _'thems_ '; _they_ call the shots; _they_ are the ones who can keep her here and in solitary confinement for months and months on end. And she isn't going back there again. _No._ And she can't risk having her baby by herself in SHU. That _would be_ and _is_ a nightmare.

"You're at their mercy whether you like it or not."

* * *

Someone tried to _'test'_ her a few weeks into her stay.

She had been in the fields from dusk till dawn for most of twelve hours raking and, on some days, troweling the ground _(she's new, a Class 4, so she has to work her way up to a Class 2 to get the 'decent' or more 'desirable' jobs, which could take up to about 30 days to level up each classification)_ when she walked into her cell and saw three women she recognised sitting on her bed and she remembered then, what her cellmate had told her on her second day : _"You're a_ **fish** ** _[new prisoners]_** _and you just scream privileged. It's so obvious and they will exploit that from you if you let them. This is prison; you have to be ready for a fight at all times, even though you've never fought a day in your life out on the streets."_

She's never been in a fistfight whatsoever, not a day in her life. But she thinks she remembers the mechanics of throwing a punch. Archer had taught her in ninth grade when Billy Dresden kept bothering her in PE because she was small and flat-chested in comparison to the other girls; she was a late-bloomer.

Prison is all about survival. It's her or them. Because if she would have let them go about _their_ business in _her_ business, she'd never see the end of it until _(if)_ she gets out.

_"And don't be polite about it, Montgomery. They don't respond to 'please' or 'do you mind'. Be rude. They're not Hannibal Lecter."_

And as much as she hates it when people touches her things and being in her space, she really isn't ready to be involved in any kind of fight this early on, or, to be honest, ever, because she really needs to get out of here on good behaviour. She cannot afford to be picking fights, but she also doesn't want to be labelled as a pushover or for the women to walk all over her.

Prisons are not made for people like herself.

She swallowed the lump in her throat, willed her voice not to shake. "Did I give you permission?" she didn't wait for a response, "No. You can't come into my cell without permission. Now, go over there. You live there." she pointed towards the direction of their cells.

"Torres gave us permission," One of the three countered.

_Why sit on her bed, then?_

But she'd bet on her life that Callie didn't.

"I don't care. I didn't. This is my cell too. I'll let her know you guys stopped by."

They looked at her for a good whole minute, they were sure to make her cave, she didn't though, and they got up at left.

And when they left, she released a breath she didn't know she was holding and it was only then she noticed that her hands were shaking.

* * *

The first night, her first night, she didn't sleep at all. Not a wink. And she couldn't, even if she tried. And besides, there was this impossibly execrable ticking from the clock, that was feet and feet away from her cell, that kept her awake.

_(and would for many nights to come.)_

She was _terrified_ , and that was not even an accurate portrayal, word, adjective to describe what she had felt. She was way past terrified that she was sure there wasn't a word to describe how scared she was because — _what the fuck was she doing with a compound full of criminals?_

_(well, she's one of them, now. in paper, in record, she is and will always be one of them, and that's where it matters.)_

She was shaking and not because she was cold. It was April and warm enough for the beginnings of spring. To make matters worse, the prison was swarming with flies. She had no idea where they'd come from, and she had never seen so many before. All she wanted was to not accidentally breathe in one and choke on them while she was sleeping. She needed to come up with a way for them to leave her alone, but all she had was a towel-thin-so-called-blanket, that could barely fit her entire frame, to keep them from biting her long limbs and having to itch all night long.

She wanted to cry so badly and waste all her tears away, because she is in _... prison_.

_Prison._

_PRISON!_

She should cry, she reckoned, let it all out, have one good cry until her head started pounding, so that she wouldn't want to bawl her eyes out every single night henceforth.

Because slowly, as the day edged towards night _(she had spend most of her first day sitting in bed and watching everyone go about their life as though this was normal)_ it had all started to become so surreal for her. And when she was finally all alone _in_ her thoughts, when her ' _roommate'_ walked into their shared cell and used the ' _bathroom'_ , that's when it clicked in her head, that she'd better get used to this life, this change in privacy and quickly, too, because sooner or later, she would be needing to use the ' _facilities'_ _._

She kept to herself on her top bunk, didn't dare look at her cellmate, except for when she gave her a heads up that she'd be doing the _number_ _two_. She supposed she ought to do the same thing when — oh, but she prayed and hoped and planned to never have to. She'd rather end up in hospital because having to defecate in a cell with someone right next to you is humiliating and dehumanising.

That night, she didn't ask for her cellmate's name or try to make any small talk and she didn't, too. And so she decided to keep her tears and emotions to herself for tonight because she didn't want her cellmate to think that she was a weakling, especially not since the women, when she went to chow hall for dinner, let it be known to her of what her cellmate had done to end up in here.

_Were they rumors? Were they not?_

She didn't know and she would never ask. Someone at the county jail had told her to never ask that question — _what are you in for?_ — if she wants to stay alive till the end of her sentence.

_Keep to yourself. Mind your own business._

The women were only trying to scare her off, she told herself — _but off to where exactly?_

It had somehow only dawned on her, then — right now at _'lights out' —_ that prison will be her home for the next X number of years, and that didn't happen at sentencing, not when the judge hit his gravel. Not when she was being fingerprinted, or placed in a holding cell beneath the court before they transferred her to jail, not in the six hour drive up here, and not during intake, which she had to block from her memory and mind just to get through it for the rest of her life. _No_. It felt like a revelation struck in lightning just for her. All the smells, all the sights and the dull, depressing colours, the women and guards in bright blue uniforms, her prison blues as well, with her prison ( _basically sole-less_ ) shoes and prison pointy bra (which definitely isn’t her and underwear that were a size too small and big, respectively, and itches — it all screamed _"YOU'RE IN FUCKING PRISON"_.

She had managed to be the first Montgomery to land themselves in prison. This is a correctional facility, not science camp or a sleepover. They will correct her in here. She will be corrected and be ready for society once again, where she'll come out labeled as a convict, felon, an outcast. But that's not what matters to her most, not the labels, itself, but how it's going to affect her and her future. Because how is she going to get a job with a felony record.

She already can't ever be a doctor. She can't travel the world.

Her life is over. It ends here, with prison. She might as well never get out and let her roommate smother her in her sleep.

The tangent loop she was going around and around in her head must have been screaming at loud like a banshee because her roommate seemed to be saying something. "Shut your eyes, Montgomery," she heard her whisper and her heart thudded painfully loud in her chest. It's her first day and she's already gotten onto her roommate's bad side. "If I was gunna fight you, you'd know about it. I'm not gunna kill you in your sleep, I'd take it outside. Have you given me a reason to fight you, Montgomery?"

_Had she?_

She didn't think so and she had no plans or desires to fight her roommate, ever.

"I — I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to —"

Her roommate clicked her tongue, then.

_What was it now?_

_"_ Never apologise. Don't be soft. You won't make it through the week with that goodie attitude, Montgomery. You make a mistake, you stand your ground, even though you know you're in the wrong because they're going to do the same. It doesn't matter who's right or wrong in here. This is prison. Life’s not black and white. Forget everything you learned on the streets. You're here to do time and survive. It's you or them. It's us or the COs. That's it. There's no reform and all that fucking bullshit — You listening?" she asked in a harsh whisper. Not an angry one, just a harsh and loud enough one for only her to hear and not anyone else, and definitely not the COs because she imagine she'd get written up for it.

Nodding quickly, "Yes," she said after realising that her roommate, of course, wouldn't be able to see her since she, herself, was on the top bunk.

She hadn't slept in a bunk bed since third grade science camp.

"Now, get some sleep. Your real first day in prison starts tomorrow. And boy, it's gunna be a long ass day for you." she heard the lilt in her voice and she didn't know if it was an encouragement or a threat.

"Thank you." she said instead.

Somehow that was also wrong because her roommate started to groan, she sensed that she was annoyed with her, and she could practically see her rolling her eyes now.

But for the life of her, she didn't know what she had said or done that was in the wrong. "You need some street in you, Montgomery. Forget what your momma taught you. That won't do you any good up in here. They'll walk right all over you."

"So, act like I've got no manners, you mean?"

"No. That's not what I said," she said slowly as though talking to a child, "What I meant is choose the right time and right people to be nice to. But don't be an asshole to everyone, that's how you'd get your ass whopped. You don't just look tough, you have to sound the part, too."

She nodded. "That makes sense."

"I know."

The statement hang heavy in the air between them, devastating in its honesty. After a while of silence, when she thought her roommate couldn't possibly have fallen asleep already, she cleared her throat before asking, "Hey ... Are you still awake?"

She made a noncommittal noise in response, clearly she wasn't. "What is it, Montgomery?"

"What is your name?"

"Don't tell me those girls hadn't already told you my name," her roommate said, shaking her head. She heard it as her curls rustle against the hard cotton of the pillowcase.

Her roommate must have seen them at dinner swarming around her like the flies that live here —

And she didn't understand what transpired next because one minute, she was lying down, she was calm, she was collected, she was fine _(as fine as one could be in prison)_ , she was listening to her roommate, and the next, her heart started jackrabbiting out of the blue, pounding out threatening rhythms in her chest like it was wanting to runaway. Then, it was her ears — loud ringing was what she heard and not Callie Torres anymore and before she knew it, she was trying her best to gulp down whatever breath she could swallow, but her throat felt like it was being gripped in a vice.

She panicked and she panicked as one failure led to another. Try as hard as she might, she just couldn't seem to loosen the tight, panicked knot in her chest. So, she closed her eyes. She couldn't deal with this right now. But then again, she didn't think she could deal with anything right now. The weight of her entire existence was too heavy on her shoulders.

 _Breathe_ , she thought to herself, breathe it all out.

But she couldn't. She just couldn't release this lump of stress out from her chest, she couldn't let it go, because she felt as though it had permanently found a home to fester in, to disease and grow.

Because now she's in a cop car and they're taking her to the nearest precinct.

A door slamming down the hall ricochetted through her, and that was the first time she had ever been handcuffed or arrested _(she got into a bit of trouble with the law for unpaid parking tickets and a DUI when she was a teen in Connecticut but it was something money could fix)_. They had put her in a women's holding cell with twelve of them altogether, mainly addicts and street walkers, all either smoking a cigarette or curled in a corner, sleeping _'it'_ off.

All she could think of at that moment was how she had her psychiatry rotations tomorrow and she wasn't ready for it even in the slightest.

That was when she spent eighteen hours working her way through various stages of the NYPD's booking process and discovered the several painful realities of the criminal justice system in New York City.

" _that 24-hour shit sounds good and all, but we can keep you here as long as we want. You could be here for 94 hours — I don't care."_

But she's still only in the precinct and she remembered them taking her out of the holding cell, strapped her in handcuffs so tight that left her wrists bloody and raw, as though she was planning to run off in a building filled with cop and guns holstered to their belts, and they stuffed her into a tiny room with huge end-to-end mirrors on opposite walls. She knew there were people on the other side, watching her, watching them. She wasn't sleeping through the eighties; she knew that they were one-way mirrors and somehow, foolishly, it was only then that it registered in her head that she was in there to be interrogated.

_But what for?_

_What ever happened to due process?_

She didn't do anything. She didn't do any of what they were accusing her of. It was all wrong, twisted into another story because that wasn't what actually happened.

She tried to explain again and again, over and over, pleading for them to just listen to her, but they wouldn't. They didn't want to hear what she had to say, but she _wouldn't — couldn't_ tell them the honest truth either. She couldn't because she wasn't alone in the car. Regardless, they had already made up their minds and to them, whatever she was spewing were just plain lies and fallacies.

_"If you don't tell us the truth, the prosecution is going to make an example out of you."_

She would have to conform to their version of the truth, that was what they had meant.

_"I know your type. We see it all the time. Daddy bought your apartment. Daddy pays for your tuition. You get an allowance. Rich kids like you have it easy. Y'all think you're above the law and you always get away with it. But not this time, Daddy won't be able to pay your way out this."_

That was when she knew she might have just dug her own grave earlier by trying to explain what had happened and that the REAL truth, to which they didn't care about, will not even be able to set her free; she needed a lawyer.

" _I_ _want to make a phone call."_

_"You will get your call. But you have to answer to us first."_

They questioned her some more. They screamed at her some more. They threatened her a lot more and accused her like she hadn't already heard it all in the last four hours. And through it all in that tiny room, where she was scared shitless, she didn't shed a tear. All those years of Bizzy instilling her the power to not cry anywhere but in her bedroom really did paid off.

 _"I want a lawyer."_ — was all she said time and time again, voice low, though she knew she sounded a lot more confident than how she really was feeling inside. She was so visibly shaking and by the end of it, her teeth were chattering so bad that she could hardly even speak. She knew they had purposefully lowered the temperature to torture her into confessing to their version of truth.

They left and they came back, they left and they came back with a Starbucks and doughnuts but she didn't take any of it. Though, as the hours ticked by, there were moments where she was sure she'd break.

Because she just really wanted to cry. She was tired, cold, hungry, so pale that her lips were turning purple, she noticed when she looked at herself in the one-way mirror. She was only wearing a T-shirt because it was sticky hot September and not fucking freezing January, and her head was pounding so bad as well, that it felt like it was going to explode.

Because three huge men with body holsters and in windbreakers that screamed **VICE** at the back were shouting in her face, literally inches from her, spittle flying everywhere and landing on her lip, here, there and everywhere in between, and were demanding to know whom she was working for.

 _I'm a medical student_ , she thought to herself.

 _"I want a lawyer,"_ she said through chattering teeth.

When it was all over, they threw her back into the damp and sweaty and hot holding cell and she fell to her hands and knees. She didn't know if they had done it on purpose but she tripped all the same.

A sweet girl, whom she landed right beside, with track marks up and down her arms helped her up, though.

"Jessica." she said in introduction.

"Addison."

"What'd you do, Addison?" she asked.

"Well, I — " she started, wrapping her arms around herself, still shaking, "I don't really know."

At that point, she still hadn't had her phone call yet.

..

Presently, someone from afar was calling her name. It felt like her head was underwater.

"Derek?"

Her head felt like it was going to explode.

Bizzy was right, she couldn't do anything right. She always managed to mess things up for herself and make them worse because she managed to get herself arrested yet again, a month, after posting bail — after violating the Order of Protection.

She wasn't in the same Central Booking the second time, she was in Manhattan, but it stank all the same, just as it did in Brooklyn. She wasn't scared this time around though, mainly because she had just been tased and manhandled to the ground and slammed onto the hood of a police car and she was just so thoroughly exhausted, and in pain that she just wanted to sleep and not be disturbed.

Things couldn't possibly get any worse than this, she thought to herself. _This had to be what rock bottom is. This has to._ She was just literally shoved to the ground, her cheek was pressed onto the asphalt, which left her with road rash and a bruise around her eye from when the cop slammed her on the cop car.

She did what she did the second time, she deserved to be arrested the second time and she will stand by it but she won't stand by what they were accusing her of.

..

She tried to breathe, but she couldn't. Her breath quickened and a pain in her heart.

_Was this a panic attack? Am I really having a panic attack right now?_

..

When she received a summons in the mail, explaining that the grand jury had indicted her, she was arraigned for yet the third time in her entire life. Her passport and travel documents were confiscated since she had the means and money to _'skip town'_ and her bail was set higher than they were previously, up until her trial _(most cases don't even go to trial)_ , which never went that far because she had signed a plea agreement as per Archer's brilliant plan.

He came to her apartment the morning before her schedule sentencing so that they could go over the plan. Because they had planned to more than just ' _skip town_ ' so as to speak. Archer had had everything ready — passports, money, their new names and their cover story.

"This is wrong, Archer," she said, shaking her head as she flipped through their very genuine looking but very fake passports.

"So is what they're doing to you, Addison. I won't let my baby sister go to prison."

The plan was for her to leave the night before her sentencing, after the bail bondsmen and cops had come over for one of their _'surprise'_ check-ins, in which, she had to be home or be somewhere near the vicinity so she could go back home as quickly as possible because if not, she'd be sent straight to the county jail for violating her bail conditions.

She had already packed a bag that afternoon and had hid it somewhere the cops will never find. Then, once she was out, they would meet up at the corner of Waverley Place, next to the bookstore where there was a blind spot, and then, they'll drive to the airport and they'll run off to either Spain or France and never come back or at least until the statute of limitation had passed.

It sounded so simple, so easy to execute — all she had to do was act out a part and she'd been doing exactly that her entire existence — and even if it would make her look more guilty of the crime she didn't commit, she was determined to follow through.

She was going to escape.

..

But that obviously didn't happen.

Because she's right here, in prison, having the worst panic attack of her life.

Because they somehow didn't account for Derek not listening to her and showing up unannounced at her apartment just before she was about to make her escape.

She had called him earlier in the day to tell him not come over because she would very much rather like to be alone for the night and she'd just see him in court in the morning.

Because there was a knock on the door just as she was about to open it to leave. A bag in her hand, she froze as if one wrong step would detonate her whole life. It still very much could. She swallowed — maybe it was all in her head, but then, there was another knock, harder and louder this time, all-confirming that it wasn't.

 _Please don't let it be the cops, please don't let it be the cops,_ she prayed and prayed for God to be on her side for once because she didn't want guns pointing in her face anymore.

It wasn't the cops; they didn't announced themselves, or threaten to break down her door. She heard keys chiming before the doorknob started to jiggle and the next thing she knew, the door was opening and there they were — her boyfriend and his best friend with bags of takeout, and both looking at her with wide eyes as they looked back and forth from her and the bag in her hand.

She nearly had a heart attack all the same.

To be honest, though, she would very rather it be the cops since it'd be easier to deal with them.

She could see a patchwork of thoughts running through Mark's face, maybe he wanted to make a joke to lighten the mood _(it would only be fitting for him to do so)_ , but he didn't.

He just cleared his throat. "Umm — I will leave you two —" he gestured with his free hand between Derek and her before turning and leaving, "I'll be downstairs."

Her bag was still in her hand, she was still frozen in place and all Derek did for a long while was dart at her than down at her bag, her and her bag and all over again.

"You packed lightly," he stated, voice drained and he closed the distance between them.

"There isn't much to pack," she replied and their eyes locked. He looked so sad with tears in eyes and a deep frown etched on his face.

"You weren't going to say goodbye," another statement, not a question. "Don't leave like this, Addie," His words held a plea to them. She wondered if he was begging her to not leave because he knew it might be forever.

"I wrote you a letter explaining," she said, pointing dumbly at the paper on the coffee table, "I only signed the plea deal because I had a plan."

"To jump sentencing, you mean? Did you know they weren't going to grant you bail? Your lawyer told me that. Do you even know how much trouble you're going to be in? They're going to get a warrant for your arrest. They're going to find you. Your plea deal will most likely be revoked. You could possibly get the maximum. That's twenty five years, plus more because of this."

"Don't you think I know that?"

"Well, I think you haven't thought this through enough."

She couldn't believe her ears and she narrowed her eyes at him "How dare you?" she yelled, raising her voice and making Derek flinch because of her sudden reaction. "How dare you say that to me?"

"Addison, I didn't —"

"No," she came closer, advancing onto him, eyes narrowing and he backed away, panicked and uncomprehending, "No. You meant it. And you have no idea what I've been going through. While you're in school and learning, I've done nothing but _think_ these last two week. I've been right here, in my apartment. I don't go out because I'm afraid I'll get arrested all over again — This is all on your family, Derek." she stared at him, poked a pointed finger at him, furious. But it was a quiet, dangerous rage, boiling behind her eyes, swelling inner throat.

There was a long, weighted silence before she spoke again. "Your mother never liked me. She must be pleased she's finally getting me away from you." she exhaled shakily at that, and she brought a hand to her mouth to keep herself from crying.

 _She will not cry. She will not cry_ , she told herself, clenching her jaws so tight her teeth were grinding with each other.

Her chest constricted as she considered why Carolyn Shepherd didn't quite like her. She was always nice to her. She was always polite to her. She never did anything to hurt Derek or push him away from them. She had always treated her daughters like they were her own sisters. She loved them like they were her family. But — _don't you know, blood is thicker than water?_

And she's not _blood_ not like Amy is.

Sometimes, more so these past seven months, she wished she had never met Derek.

"Addie, come on, that's not true." he encircled one hand around her wrist gently and she rolled her eyes at that, impatient, and pulled away from his grasp. "I'm not stupid, Derek. She left me in that precinct. She saw me, I know she did." To which Carolyn Shepherd said that she did not _("I would have gotten her out of there if I knew, Derek. Believe me."),_ "She looked me straight in the eye, Derek, when I was in that holding cell."

When Carolyn Shepherd came to pick Amy up from the precinct — because she was a minor and all, she wasn't subjected to the treatment she got — she didn't even have the decency to tell Derek that she too had been arrested or helped get her a lawyer so she could get out of there sooner.

_Mrs. Shepherd! Thank God. I'm so glad to see you. Is Amy alright?_

But it was like she didn't know her at all. She took one look at her and left.

She had to do that all on her own in Central Booking, though she did make a couple of phone calls in the precinct a few hours after the interrogation. No one had picked up her calls. Not Archer. Not Derek nor Mark. Her parents weren't in the country, so there was no point in phoning them.

She had never felt as alone as she felt at that moment on that cold cement bench in Central Booking.

After a moment, he turned his face away, murmuring a tiny, heartbroken apology. "I'm so sorry."

"Derek," she sighed, "It wasn't your fault."

"I don't know why she'd do that," each word was heavy with a weary apology, and this time she didn't protest. "I don't know, Addie. But I know for sure that I'm never speaking to her ever again. I can't forgive her for this. I will never."

"Derek," she started, takes a few steps forward and rests a gentle hand on his forearm. She didn't want to be the rift between him and his family, "They're your family."

Her eyes clouded with exhaustion, her pale face increasing the look of a worn out woman. The urge to protect her increased and he pulled her towards him, cradling her face in his hands and caressing her cheeks with his thumb. "You're my family. You're the only family I need."

Addison leaned into his hands, enjoyed the warmth spreading into her through them and her lips gazed his wrist in a sudden want to feel his skin.

Probably will be her last time.

"I'll go with you." he said quickly, all in one breath. And if she wasn't listening and waiting for him to say something further, she would have most definitely missed it.

"What?"

She took a large step back, away from his warmth.

"I'll go with you. Wherever you're going. I'm not leaving you."

"No." she scoffed, shaking her head. "No. You'll be — what's that called — harbouring a fugitive. No, Derek. They'll put you in prison, too."

"And what about Archer?" he lifted an eyebrow, challengingly.

Reality fell like a cleaver between them, and Addison's face turned somber, pretense of normalcy gone. "How'd you know?"

"Because this plan sounds as convoluted as your brother."

"But Archer wants to do this." she explains.

"And I do too."

"I won't let you, Derek."

"I'm not asking for your permission." he held out both hands to her.

She took what he was offering and interlaced their fingers together. "What about medical school?"

One of them should have their dreams come true, at least. She had already been expelled months ago, since it all started. And with a felony and possibly fugitivus, she could never be a doctor.

She knew he could read her thoughts then, and they just looked at each other for long moments, wide-eyed and filled with _goodbyes_. Derek brought his arms up around her back, and she stood there letting it happen. She didn't move. She barely breathed. She let out a shuddering breath against his shirt, and she think she might be crying as she wrapped her arms around him.

They leaned into one another, drawing strength from each other or maybe consuming it. Burning it on a pyre.

She didn't want to have to let go.

 _Ever_.

They stood there forever, and for a while, for the first time since this whole debacle began, she didn't have to think.

"Screw medical school. I don't want to spend another day without you. I love you, Addie."

Without hesitation he leaned down and captured her lips with his, devouring her mouth like it was his only thing to hold on. Addison felt this was goodbye, and she couldn't stop the sob escaping her lips while he still kissed her.

..

She wanted to get up. She wanted to get out of this stupid bunk bed. She needed to breathe.

God, she couldn't breathe.

"Calm down," she whispered to herself. She could feel herself working herself up worse. Nevertheless, she somehow made it to the cold and concrete ground.

She suddenly felt cold and flushed at the same time and she pulled her blanket tightly around her. Her breathing was so quick now, it felt like her lungs weren't letting in any air at all.

_Breathe. Breathe. Breathe._

She was trying to control the burning anxious pit in her stomach, repeating that everything was going to be just fine when Torres told her that she couldn't do that with her blanket but her throat tightened all over again and she couldn't say anything like — _why?_

"You need to get back up there, Montgomery, before they see you." Torres warned her.

"I need — I need the bathroom." she tried to sound light and casual but was not sure she was pulling it off.

She didn't need to use the _'bathroom'_. And even if she needed to, she don't think she can with people around her.

_No. No. No._

She could hear her pulse now — loud and fast — in her ears as she threw her blanket off around her. She started to burn up even more; and the blanket landed on the floor. Upon hearing shuffling behind her, she turned around, she could see her roommate, her head cocked to one side, watching her with a look of confusion and — although she couldn't quite place why, that look made her feel worse.

She glanced up at the foliage, and suddenly she felt like the walls and everything were closing in above her.

"Montgomery?" came a whisper from the darkness. "You alright?"

She turned back around. It was her roommate, but her expression was so dead serious. It scared her. Her chocolate brown eyes were replaced with concern.

The tightness in her chest clenched again.

"I'm fine." She turned back towards the wall, braced her hands there. She breathed more heavily now, starting to panic at the lack of air and she clutched at her chest.

She tried to take a deep breath, but it got caught at the back of her mouth. The ceiling above her were definitely getting closer, the light fading rapidly from the other side. She leaned against a wall, trying to steady the shaking of her knees.

She'd never had a panic attack before, but she knew something like this was bound to happen sooner or later; she just didn't ever think that it'd be in prison.

Addison tried so hard to hold back her tears. Not to let her roommate see that she was on the verge of a breakdown. She kept her right hand against her mouth, biting hard on her lip to try and prevent a full out breakdown. But she had this huge ache in her stomach that wouldn't leave her alone.

One little pearl of water slowly made its way down her cheek, but no sound came out of her mouth. She could feel actual pain of trying so hard to keep herself from crying. There was just so much a _normal_ girl could take. She knew. She just knew worse was coming and she wanted to know that she would be okay, that she would get out of here soon enough. She wanted to know that she was here and there was nothing to be ashamed of.

"Montgomery?" She heard her name, and realised she'd closed her eyes as her thoughts overtook her. When she opened them Torres was peering into her face, her face glowing with disbelief. "Are you for real?" Her hand was on her shoulder, then she groaned, "Good Lord, Montgomery, don't tell me you're having a panic attack right now. You just got here."

She couldn't reply, her throat was closing up inside her and each breath was more difficult than the one before it. Her head swam and her insides clenched up within her.

"Montgomery." Torres's hands gripped her tightly, giving her a little shake. "Alright, Montgomery, take a deep breath. You're fine — you're not _lost_. You're in prison. You're in your cell. You're with me."

 _Okay_. Torres grounding words echoed in her brain, and she suddenly realised how dry her mouth was —and a wave of nausea hit her, her stomach flipping over inside her.

"Come on, deep breaths now." Torres repeated, giving her another small shake that upset her stomach more. She tried to take a breath, but it caught at the back of her throat again and made her gag.

The first heave was very dry; her heart was racing against the knot in her chest, and her stomach churning. She didn't even have time to warn Torres before the second heave gripped her. She was sure she could feel the contents of her stomach forcing its way up her oesophagus, then it was in her mouth. She pitched forwards, hearing the _belch_ escape her mouth, and the ground at her feet was coated in her vomit.

Torres had moved, she could feel a hand gently patting her back and saying, "You're okay, when you can take a deep breath."

But she couldn't take any breath, almost instantly her mouth was refilled with sour liquid and another wave of puke hit the toilet this time. Her stomach was still contracting painfully, the air catching in her chest as she retched again. The hand on her back was rubbing up and down her spine as she dry heaved repeatedly.

There was a rattling on the bars of their cell then and she vaguely hears a female CO.

"Torres. What's wrong with her? Another junkie?"

"No. She's new." Torres said in way of explanation, "Is all just really starting to sink in for her."

"Handle her or with stick her in psych. Then, it'll _really_ sink in real quick."

"I'll make sure she gets it," Torres was saying.

She wanted to say she needed to get out of here — then she'd be fine, but when she opened her mouth another heave caught her and a further wave of sickness poured out of her mouth. Her stomach muscles were really aching, and her head beginning to spin from the continual retching.

"It's the psychiatric unit." she heard Torres's worried voice, "You need relax or they'll strip you naked and keep you there until God knows when. I've been there and it's not a place you'd want to be."

Her stomach felt empty as she dry heaved towards the ground. She just needed to take a breath, then her head would stop swimming and they'd be able to get to sleep once again.

"I — _uuurpp_!" The heave came right after the breath, and a grinding pain shot through her stomach. She was empty — surely the heaving had to stop.

"Deep breath, Montgomery," Torres's voice was clear, "In through your nose, out through your mouth." she managed the _in_ bit, but once the air was inside her, a retch forced its way out.

"And again." That time she managed it better, in and out.

"And again." She did it again and the tightness in her chest began to ease up, as did the swimming sensations in his head. "That's it, keep going." Torres encouraged, her hand still rubbing on her back.

"I ..." she tried to speak, but her throat was gravelly and it burned; she was still trembling from head to foot. "I really need to get out of here." She struggled to sit on the ground, weakly.

"Don't say things like that out loud," Torres said patiently, "You'll be in solitary for the rest of your sentence. They'll keep you for conspiracy to commit escape. Just catch your breath for a second."

She felt like she'd been hit by a bus, weak and shaky all over.

"Please, I can't breathe in this _box_." she urged, the panicked sensation rising in her chest again.

Torres grabbed hold of Addison's trembling hand and said, "It's this box or psych or seg. And I'll take this box any day. I don't know what you did, Montgomery, but you're in prison now. The sooner you get that in your head, the easier it will be for you. Well, not easier — it will never get easier — but, you take it one day at a time."

"I — I can't," she choked out almost sobbing, "breathe" she wheezed looking absolutely terrified.

"Look at me," Torres says and she pushed her back flat against the wall, "Follow my voice."

"Imagine a stream," she said.

Addison closed her eyes, but in the dark behind her lids she could see another image superimposed — _Derek_ in Torres's place, soothing words, and a quiet stream.

' _Derek's_ ' hands were stroking through her hair, gently like she last remembered. It was only a few days ago but it already felt like years had passed since she's seen him. "A quiet, peaceful stream. The sun is shining, and you can feel it warm on your skin."

She tried to picture it, she really really tried, but continued to speak through cotton mouth the entire time and voicing her despair for not being able to breathe.

"You wade into the water. It's warm around your ankles. You're all alone, and there's nothing to fear. The birds sing in the trees."

"I can't!" she shrieked as loud as she could with the small breath she had, which wasn't loud enough to bring attention from the prison guards.

‘ _Derek'_ just hushed her and looked at her sternly. "Try." _he_ said looking at her with _his_ concern filled, and horror ridden eyes, all the while clutching her hand.

 _Try_.

Finally, she did try. She took one deep breath before concentrating in letting it out, nice and slow.

"You're totally safe."

_She's totally safe._

"Derek ..."

"You can feel free to relax and let the current carry you." ' _Derek_ ' said softly, smoothing the hair from her eyes and tucking them behind her ear.

She felt free. She floated and let the current take her anywhere she ought to be.

"Nothing will happen to you here."

It's then that ' _Derek_ ' intertwine their fingers together, squeezing her hand tightly.

"Nothing will happen to me here." she repeated.

‘ _Derek_ ' agreed with a smile, wiping her tears away with _his_ sleeve and she pulled _him_ closer as she pressed her forehead against _his_ , nervously making their noses touch.

 _He_ spoke so close to her lips that she could actually feel the word, " _Montgomery_ ," roll out of _his_ tongue. But the strange thing was that it was not even his voice she hear this time and she didn't really care because she feels _safe_.

‘ _Derek_ ' leaned forward just a little so there was barely a breath of air between them and dusts _his_ lips over hers.

Maybe it made a certain kind of sense. Maybe it made sense here, at the end of the world where she couldn't leave this hell and nothing could matter but this moment — ' _Derek'_ is here — and she too pressed her lips to _hers_ , just once, a peck.

She felt all tingly. _Calm_. She felt less alone. _Calm_. She felt less like she was in prison.

It tasted like crying, though.

* * *

Moments passed, Addison had finally come down from her panicky cloud and she'd managed to climb back up to her bunk bed without making a further fool of herself.

She lay down, shut her eyes, had no idea how much time had passed since her panic attack started, or what time it was, and she breathed in with her nose and breathed out with her mouth — breathing continually to even out over the next few minutes. Eventually, she opened her eyes and sunk further into this poor excuse of a mattress and looked up at the ceiling.

They didn't talk about it — about what just happened, or who kissed whom, or why — and she don't think she can handle it right now _(or ever)_.

_It's so embarrassing._

She told herself that it was because she thought it was Derek.

But her subconscious knew.

_Right?_

She was just scared, that was it, petrified of getting on Torres' bad side from all the rumours she had heard at dinner.

It was then that her stomach growled loudly.

"Montgomery, I can hear your stomach." Torres deadpanned.

"I'm sorry. I'm just — I haven't eaten all day."

She let out an exasperated sigh then; she practically heard her eyes rolling. "You newbies think you can wait until your commissary comes in — but don't you know you'll starve to death till by then." It's not a question, she thought, but nonetheless, she heard a box being opened and it closed.

It looked like her cellmate was pretending it didn't happen, as well.

After two more deep breaths, Torres was standing on her own bed, so she could reach up to the top bunk. Facing her once again. "Here. I call it _FOREO_." Torres said, a little too close for her comfort and she handed her a packet of cookies.

She pushes back a little toward the wall .

"Fake OREOs. These are the only good ones in commissary."

There was something in the way that Torres looked at her that made her glance up. It reminded her of home. She looked this time, really looked, seeing past the usual dark circles and exhausted lines that came with prison.

Torres couldn't be any older than her.

She looked like a girl trying to be tough in a world full of vultures.

"Oh. I can't."

It did kind of looked like OREOS.

"Don't be stupid. Have it. I won't charge you extra. Just a packet of these will do when your money comes in." Torres said and she sat up, taking the _FOREO_ offered. "Thank you. I promise I'll pay you back."

Torres made a noncommittal sounds as she explained to her how debts are settled in prison; it's double the amount every day you don't pay back.

Two becomes four, and four becomes eight, eight becomes sixteen on the fourth day and the rest of her explanation was lost to the roar of blood in her ears, she swallowed once, twice because she's so hungry, she salivating, basically drooling for prison cookies as she tore open the the packet.

"You know what, I wish I had me as a bunkie when I was a newbie. Instead I got ... an addict. Then, a nut case who drowned her kids because ' _they'_ told her to. That sicko almost drowned me too."

Addison took an eager bite of the _FOREO_ , having eaten nothing since jail last night, peanut butter sandwich, and almost spat it out altogether because it was too sweet — so much so that it hurts her teeth.

"One thing you should know — don't let the COs see you trading food. They'll write you up for ' _trafficking and trading'_."

"Trafficking and trading?"

"It's so dumb, I know," she heard the ruffling of the rough cloth of the pillowcase as Torres nodded, "It's a minor disciplinary report. But you're gonna loose privileges — phone, visit, commissary, everything. Now, finish up quick, and sleep. Morning starts at five."

She planned to wake up at four, so she could take a shower alone, or at least have less people in there with her while she was naked, when most are asleep.

Once she was done eating, she closed her eyes, felt them grow heavier and heavier while wild perfidy fluttered in her chest, reckless and all-consuming.

"Montgomery?"

She mumbled a _'yes'._

"Don't believe every thing those girls tell you." Was the last thing she heard before she closed her eyes.

* * *

_**Hey guys! Thanks for reading! So Addison is in prison and Callie too. What’d you think they did?** _

_**What do you guys think of this chapter? Its a long one but i would really like to know what you guys think. Please leave a review!** _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No, I have never gone to prison.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we meet a familiar face, yet not so familiar. ;)

**Out of Sight, Out of Mind  
** _**Chapter Two** _

_"Once you‘re in handcuffs, you know you have no control left over your life"_

* * *

Dreams are elusive. Figments of reality. Advices among dusted doors and darkened corridors. When Addison Montgomery dreams these days ... it's always a prelude of horrors to come and desires trapped among the chains of her own mind. And it’s not a whole lot different when she wakes up in the morning.

Dreams always managed to fly away when she was in Derek Shepherd's presence. _(Her visitor list is still pending for approval, so it has been almost a month since she has seen him. That’s three weekends where she stayed mostly in her cell, listening to and taking the guards' taunts because she can't, doesn't want to_ _go outside to see people happy and smiling after coming back from seeing their loved ones without being jealous that she has not seen hers since her sentencing.)_ Be it as it may, the warm feelings of safety she was able to feel made her mind calm, carefully blank. Made her limbs grow relaxed, and her breaths to even out among the soft tell tale of Derek's warmth.

But there were times, sometimes, when Derek, her personal dream catcher, failed to trap her nightmares in his web and they would warm their way in. Often in the form of symbolisms whose meanings were too complex and convoluted for her to properly understand. Other times in the form of cruel, horrible, despicable visions that only managed to make her scream.

These days, she doesn't remember what she dreams when she wakes up, or more accurately, when she's being violently shaken by Torres to wake the fuck up _("It's like you wanna end up in psych.") —_ just how it made her feel and that feeling is a constant from the moment she got here.

* * *

It was a Thursday when she was transferred to prison. She only stayed in county jail for most of five days before they transported her to a proper prison that was unbeknownst to her or her family. All she knew was that she would be going somewhere within the state and that could be as far as Canada.

And there wasn't really much to do in county jail but to sit around and await sentencing but since she had already been sentenced, you know, she waited to be shipped away.

She actually didn't think it'd be so soon. But she was thankful to leave because the whole five days that she was there, she was cooped within the open bay dorm with no yard time whatsoever — indoors or outdoors. She literally couldn’t do anything because it’d be a waste to let her join a class or two since she would be leaving soon, regardless. That was what they told her.

Most people would fool around because what you do in jail don’t necessarily affect your sentencing and prison time, unless it's something illegal, then, of course, it does. She tried her best to distance herself from those people who acted like children, some were actual children, minors, but it was hard when, for some reason, they didn't like her face.

She gets a lot of that here in prison, too, for some odd reason. She’s probably just one of those people who has an unlikeable face. But Derek seems to like it and a couple of other people, too.

They had woken her up at three in the morning, on the dot, must have said something along the lines of _"off your butt, Montgomery"_ or _"get up"_ with added profanity, of course. She couldn’t remember exactly what the guard had said — hell, she can't/doesn't even want to remember half of what had happened on the day of her prison intake.

She had heard from some of the jails' _nth_ timers that intake would be a whole day event, a lot of waiting in lines like school children, a lot of being shoved around, so she told herself that she’d have to take it, whatever it my be, to not react when they're screaming in her face or pushing her around because — whatever she does from then on would affect her release date.

And also because she's a Montgomery and _Montgomeries_ are suppose to have thick skin, though when she was a kid she used to run to the Captain whenever Bizzy would chastise her, knowing full well that he would protect her.

But there is no one to run to now. There's no one to protect her here. She has to protect herself. Her dad can’t do that for her anymore.

She thinks her subconscious intentionally blocked the intake day out so she could survive prison, because that's what one does here — survive.

There were five of them and after about an hour of waiting around, their wrists were cuffed and their ankles too with shackles, all of which were connected to a chain that was wrapped around their waist. And in orange jumpsuits, they wobbled out like penguins and into a caged-like bus with windows that were barred and tinted, so their views were impeded.

So they wouldn't know where they were going.

She didn't really mind which prison she goes to — _a prison is a prison is a prison_ — she just didn't want to end up in Rikers. She had heard horror stories about that place way before she even got arrested.

The ride was by far the most stressful six hours of her entire life. She was shaking, nervous, terrified and she desperately needed to use the bathroom, but there were no such thing as bathroom breaks, which she learned from the _‘fish’_ on the opposite row as she asked if they could make a stop.

They completely ignored her, just chuckled. Those who had done this the second, fourth, fifth, sixth time told her the truth. “Girl, you gotta do it in your pants where you sit.”

Thank goodness she had the good sense to go to the bathroom beforehand.

She gets it now, that it would be a security risk to stop the bus, but she didn't then. Barely a week of being a felon, she didn't understand why they wouldn't let the girl out to pee in the woods since they were literally in the middle of nowhere and surrounded by high trees and scenic mountains. It was all she could make out of. Besides she didn’t think anyone would be dumb enough to make a run for it when they're literally hours and hours away from civilisation.

At that time, her brain was still screaming _‘HUMAN RIGHTS’_ and _‘INHUMANE’_. That Addison didn’t register in her head yet that the moment she became property of the DOJ, she’d have no control of herself or life in any way or form.

The ride to hell was a hellish one — one that reeked of urine and sweat and every kind of body odour you can think of, coupled with the heat, humidity, lack of ventilation inside the bus, it truly could've killed her altogether.

Oh, and she would never dare pee in her pants, even pregnant; she'd rather get an infection than lose what's left of her dignity.

Six hours later was when she was finally greeted with barb-wired fences within barb-wired fences and three watchtowers with guards that she was sure were ordered to _'shoot-to-kill'_.

Though she desperately needed the toilet, they weren't granted that privilege just yet, because it was time to enter the prison.

_MONTGOMERY ADDISON ADRIANNE FORBES!_

She was led down a short corridor into a small cube of a room, bare except for a gleaming metal table and a rolling cabinet. It was probably the size of a small bathroom and inside stood a female officer.

Big in size and height. Strong, muscled with arms the size of her thighs. It was hard not to be intimidated by her _(she doesn't get intimidated easily)_ and she supposed that was the entire idea.

The fluorescent lighting was just as horrible as it was in jail, but at least in here it was quiet. The stark stillness of the room was disorienting after the booming bustle of the intake lobby, and she stood awkwardly in the centre of the room, shifting from side to side after she had been _uncuffed_ and unshackled. The male guard who had brought her here had left, closed the door with a resounding click that told her it was locked.

There would be no way of getting out.

The female guard jotted something down on a clipboard, not even bothering to look up at her.

After what felt like hours, it was then that she looked up, setting her clipboard down on the table with a decisive _click_.

 _STRIP_ , she shouted at her as though she was five feet across the room and her voice boomed and bounced against the four walls as it echoed.

She did as she was told to do without a second to spare. And she probably deserved the way her fingers stuttered over the jumpsuit, the way she tripped as she toed off her shoes, the way the CO clicked her tongue and bared her teeth because she was taking too long.

"Sorry," she choked out. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry."

Nevertheless, she pulled out of her orange jumpsuit and the t-shirt she had underneath, piling it on the table without bothering to fold it. She peeled out of her of undergarments and socks last, tossing them on top her shirt so she's left standing in the room wearing nothing — nothing but her skin and bones.

All she remembers of that initial entry, of what perhaps took about less than fifteen minutes, was the CO looking at her completely bare self and all she wanted was to cover herself up, hide in a corner, and run.

She needed to run.

She didn't belong here.

She had never felt so humiliated, degraded, had never felt so much less than a human being before, as the guard with a clipboard in her hand documented every inch, every minuscule detail of her body for tattoos, scars, and markings — anything distinctive to inmate _711549._

And if all that wasn't already humiliating enough, she had to make sure that there weren’t anything hiding _up_ there, _inside_ of her, that she wasn’t attempting to smuggle any sort of contraband into the prison via orifices.

Addison fixated on the burnished gold of her badge as the woman snapped on a pair of gloves — blue, like her uniform. The sound, loud and obscene in the tiny, windowless room that she was a little ashamed of the way it made her flinch.

 _Nicole Harper_ , the ID tag read. She studied it to avoid having to look anywhere else — at Nicole's gloved hands or, God-forbid, her face. She didn't want to have to look at her one day and be remembered of this treacherous day.

It was her mouth first, being pulled apart and opened, a flashlight shinning so bright in her face that it teared her up. Then, her breasts. Luckily, it was obvious enough that she didn't have much of anything to be tucked under and in between, so it was as quick as it started. Her hair was next, and the search came back with naught. CO Harper went back to change her gloves and she was then told to face the table, _Bend over and pull your cheeks apart._ Her heart leaped into her throat, then, and she looked at the other woman as though she was speaking another language.

“What?“ she couldn’t help the hitch in her breath.

 _Standard procedure,_ she said. _Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and grip the table._ And when she didn’t comply quick enough, too shocked at what was about to come, Harper grabbed her by the shoulders, turned her around and shoved her shoulder down, hard.

Her cheek was pressed up against the cold of the stainless steel table. “I don’t — you can’t — “ she swallowed, grasping for words, absolutely panicked.

 _Yes. I can._ It took her another moment to realise what was happening when she told her to cough. But her breathing was ragged, loud in the small claustrophobic room as tears threatened to burn down her cheeks.

_What part of cough do you not get?_

She coughed.

 _Harder_.

She coughed harder.

_HARDER!_

And coughed harder she did. She coughed and coughed again and again as told, that her throat was starting to hurt really bad and a tear roll down her cheek.

She had already exposed her entire body to the utmost degree and coughing so hard that she felt like the guard wanted her to hack out a lung. Besides, if she did have something up there, which she absolutely did not, there was no way anything would stay put.

It was then that she heard the guard chuckling behind her as though this was all one big fucking joke, and she supposed it was hilarious to make jest of the girl whose cheeks were spread wide open for the ceiling, who was bare naked with the cold table cut across her hip like a knife as terror gripped her for the years that was to come next.

She was still breathing hard by the time she left the room. She didn’t say anything, just got herself clothed once again and followed the other guard out as instructed. She didn't need to get into any more trouble and humiliation — _this is how they begin to break you_ — by mouthing off at the guards when she had barely even been booked into the prison yet.

She was taken to the shower hall, next, where she stripped yet again with fifteen other women. They were given lice shampoo to clean _'everything'_ off. _Everything_. To ward off crabs and lice and all else itchy. And it didn't smell like coconuts or vanilla, it stunk so bad that she doesn’t even know how to start describing it.

The worst part, was that the smell lingers for months and months after.

She was given three sets of uniforms and a pair of shoes _(the soles were so thin and flimsy that she felt like she was basically walking on the hard cement ground)_ with her ID number — _711549_ — printed on them, two sets of underwear and bras, the pointy and perky kinds from the eighties, and a mesh bag for their laundry.

That proceeded to standing behind a desk in which she was given her prison ID card and was told to wear it at all times. _Anywhere and anything_. She was then asked — and this was word for word — _‘_ _who would you like to be called in case you died?’_. The question had stunned her at first like they were certain she would die in here. They could have worded it differently, a lot differently and used _‘emergency contact’_ or _‘in case of emergency’_ but they didn’t.

A tray of food was given to each and every one of them, to which she did not dare touch — _was it breakfast? brunch?_ — because just the sight of the slimy and cold _'bologna'_ sandwich made her retch. She just gave it to the girl next to her when she asked if she was going to eat it and the girl scoffed it down like it was a fucking gourmet dinner.

The group of them, they were separated into groups of six, were made to watch a twenty-minute video on prison rape that was so outdated and not only in terms of quality but the content and entirety of the video; it was disturbing and offensive to all women to say the least.

After that traumatising video, they were taken to medical for a simple evaluation, and the doctor there asked her basic medical questions and she answered him with as much enthusiasm she could muster.

_No, she does not have any medical conditions._

_No, she does not have any allergies._

_No, she hasn’t taken any drugs in the last forty-eight hours. Or ever._

Just to make that clear.

_No, she’s not late on her period. She had it like two weeks ago._

_No, she doesn’t think she is pregnant._

She was on the pill, and they used protection — they always use protection.

It was no fuss. It was so detached and so impersonal that she kind of finally relaxed a bit and only for a while because she was still in prison, after all.

 _(One shouldn’t ever let their guard down in here. Even_ _as simple as tying their shoes could be a death sentence.)_

She was asked to pee in a cup for a drug test that came back negative. She knew it would. She had never done drugs, had never even seen them, the hard ones at least — well, until she did and that’s why she’s here.

 _Okay_ , it’s half of the reason why she’s in prison and not in medical school right now, like Derek and Mark and Naomi and Sam and the thousands of other students across the country.

A few minutes later, another doctor walked in, he introduced himself as the prison psychiatrist and it was the quickest visit from a doctor she had ever had.

If she had blinked her eyes she would have truly missed him.

It all took about thirty seconds, or maybe even less and he asked her, "Are you going to kill yourself? I need you to say _'no'_ , because if you say _'yes'_ , we're going to put you in a pickle suit."

She said what she said not because she wasn't planning on killing herself, she said what she said out of necessity because she didn't trust him.

Still doesn’t.

Not at all.

_(Worst of all, she has to go see him once a month now that she’s pregnant.)_

Because — _how is putting someone who is potentially suicidal in a pickle suit any beneficial to their well being? How will it help them?_

Yes, it will keep them from doing the deed but that’s not how and what _‘help’_ should be.

It’s a short term solution.

It’s like putting a bandaid on a large gushing wound.

At that point, they were given all of their essentials (mattress, pillow, clothes, toiletries), she was thoroughly spent and she knew they would be going to their cells next, but fast forward five hours, they were still at the hallway, waiting to be _“buzzed“_ into their housing unit.

Apparently, it wasn’t shift change yet — whatever the hell that means!

To this day, she still doesn't understand how popping the gate open to their housing unit will affect anyone’s shift when they had like five hours left until shift change. All they had to do was open the fucking gate, so they could go in and find their cells and get settled in for the evening.

But, nevertheless, she sat on her mattress and waited for five fucking hours to finally be buzzed into her housing unit.

They've been testing her patience since this whole debacle started. It would only be a matter of time she’d snap.

She hadn’t yet.

They were then briefed by lifers on the rules and regulations of the compound, and the daily schedule. They were told that they had to go to a _‘Classification Hearing’_ tomorrow in order to get a job.

Every prisoner starts at a Classification 4, the lowest of the low, hence are given the lowest and the crappiest of all jobs. And interesting enough, scrubbing toilets are not the lowest of all lows.

They were given 12 dollars in indigent money that had been deposited into their accounts _(real money are considered contraband),_ which they could only use to purchase toiletries and hygiene products. It was really helpful because she had been wondering the entire time _(since jail because she wasn’t given anything)_ how she would take a shower with no shampoo or shower gel.

She didn't have anything to her name when she walked into prison, not a thing, nothing she had was hers anymore. It belonged to _711549_ and that was what prison is all about, she supposed; they take away everything from you so you have nothing but your thoughts.

_Mistakes and regrets._

All she had was the shower shoes — flip flops, she shared with a girl in county jail _(she wouldn’t call her a friend; more of an acquaintance)_ , and like her, she was new to all of this, and luckily, she was brought to the same prison as her — same day, same barrack, same housing unit.

"No. You can't share things with her." One of the lifers said to her.

"And _you_ don't get to tell me what to do." she blurted it out so fast that she didn’t even have time to process it in her head before saying it out loud.

She didn't mean for it to come out the way it did. But she was exhausted, basically coughed a lung out and her feet were hurting and she’d had a very very _very_ long day and was in over her head in denial, had it with everything and with everyone's nonsense, and of _‘them’_ telling her what to do.

She hadn’t had anything to eat all day and her head was aching so terribly that she didn’t know how the fuck she was going to sleep with her brain pounding in her skull so painfully like that.

She didn’t mean to take out her frustration on her.

The lifer whom she mouthed off at just looked at her and she looked back, unblinking even though she wanted to crawl and hide under a rock. The CO escorting them looked at both of them with amusement in his eyes, eager to witness what would go down.

She’d fight if she had to, even though she’ve never thrown a punch a day in her life or been in a fistfight.

She could do it. _She could fight, she could do it_ , she told herself as she stood her ground, heart pounding hard in her chest.

Nothing happened, though. The lifer just let it go, said she understood that they were all on edge.

_Thank goodness!_

And alas, when they finally get to go into their cell block — Housing Unit 2, Block B — it sounded as though she was in a field of jungle gyms put together as one. It was loud — so horribly loud that everything echoed.

And it’s always loud. Someone is always bound to be talking. Even at night.

There were people talking from all angles and corners, kissing their teeth and hissing at them. They looked at her up and down and she thought to herself how had her life managed to stir this way. She’d always been a good girl growing up, followed the rules, was always polite to everyone, never got into trouble — okay, never say never, but she’d never gotten into extreme _extreme_ trouble before.

_Don’t do bad things or you’ll end up in jail._

She still cannot comprehend the fact that she really is in prison.

She kept a straight face as she entered the cell block that was going to be her home for the next three years. Half of that for good behaviour. Scared out of her mind, she knew better than to show it.

She’d always been good at faking it.

She knew this wasn't going to be easy. The women in here weren't just here for possession or distribution or prostitution or theft, or other non-violent crimes, she was going to live amongst murderers and child molesters and people who were really disturbed and deranged in the mind.

When the guard left them alone, she began looking for her cell that was on the bottom tier but that was when a women walked right up to her, looking her up and down.

After a moment, she smirked _(an expression she thought surprising, since she looked like she'd be trampled at any second in here)_. Brushing her hair aside with one careful hand, the woman said, "My friend, today is your lucky day."

"Okay?" she asked skeptically. "Why is that?"

The women then stepped closer, as lithe as a jungle cat, and Addison was starting to suspect just as dangerous. She patted her on the cheek and said, "Because you are just so very pretty, aren't you?"

_Oh. No._

Addison swallowed. She had some inkling of where she was going with this, and she wasn’t particularly thrilled by the idea.

She didn’t want to be anybody’s bitch.

And she do not swing that way either.

"I have a boyfriend."

The women’s smirk widened at that. "How very excellent for you." she leaned closer and whispered in her ear, "If you want to make it back to him, I can offer you protection." she paused. "For a price."

The women watched her face as she tried to guess what _‘price’_ meant and how to be sure that she could actually deliver on her promise. Then, she took her wrist and slid her thumb up the sensitive inside, whispering, "No one would have to know."

The touch and the words made her shiver, and she shrugged out of her grasp quickly, didn’t like where this was going. "I’m sorry. You must have mistaken —"

Suddenly, the hand was back on her wrist, tighter than ever, and the world spun around as the women pulled her off her feet and slammed her face down on the ground, her arms hitched up tight against her back. _Ouch_. _Not again._ She straddled her lower back and leaned forward to speak in his ear, "You have no idea who I am, have you?"

She shook his head.

With what limited manoeuvring she can muster, she tried to look for a guard. She’s sure they’re watching this going on.

She felt the women’s lips smile against her ear and she shivered again. "I'm Meredith Grey. Please tell me you've heard of me."

Addison shook her head again.

_Why would she have heard of her?_

Clearing her throat, Addison asked, "Can I at least think about it, then?"

"Sure, Sweetie," she cooed in her ear before letting her go.

Meredith backed up, holding out a hand and Addison took it, after picking up her things. Meredith then took her mattress and helped her to her cell and took a seat on the lower bunk, inspecting her nails.

Another women came walking in quickly. Power walking because there was no running in prison halls, she guessed. “Get out, Grey. Sit on your own fucking bed, you cunt.”

Meredith narrowed her eyes at her before getting up and turning her attention back at her, "Don't take too long. It's almost dinner time and the animals do love fresh meat."

Addison stood there by the entryway, everyone was looking at her, hoping the fact that she was facing away from Grey hid her nervous swallow.

Her answer was no, would alway be no, and still is a no, even though Grey is persistence. Even before she ended up in solitary confinement, she was still trying toget with her. Hopefully she would have already found another project to focus on by the time she gets out of SHU.

She doesn’t want Meredith’s protection and she doesn’t need it.

* * *

_**Thanks so much for reading. I hope you enjoyed.** _  
_**So Meredith is in prison too, huh? She’s small but feisty. Don’t mess with her! Haha! What do you think she did to end up here? Honestly, I don’t even know yet. But I would love to hear what you think.** _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No, I have never gone to prison.


	3. Chapter 3

**Out of Sight, Out of Mind  
** _**Chapter Three** _

_"The kid fessed up first. You're going downtown, sweetheart"_

* * *

Apparently, New York has one of the toughest drug laws in all of fifty states. It's complex and convoluted and confusing as there are about half a dozen different classes of felonies for drug _possession_ alone.

And when it comes to the _sale_ of a controlled substance, there are just as many; five different degrees, in fact.

From the lesser, fifth degree sale of a controlled substance to first degree. From one to two and a half years to fifteen to life. And the prosecution need not even prove the defendant's knowledge of the specific quantity controlled substance sold. Nor is the defendant's physical possession of the controlled substance or actual delivery required to secure a conviction. Simply making an offer or agreement to sell may be sufficient to prove his or her intent and present ability to commit the offence.

And proof can come in a form of a statement, a confession.

_"Docket number nine-two-C-R-five-three-five-zero-one. People versus Addison Montgomery ..."_

So, when she walked up to the judge in handcuffs during arraignment one late evening, her initial court appearance, stomach churning painfully with nerves _(Archer and Derek were there watching her from the bench)_ , and the man in black robes read out her charges and told her that she had had committed a _Class B Felony_ she didn't know what to think. And it took every strength within her to not exclaim her distress and disbelief.

Because she had thought that at most it would be a misdemeanour and she'd get slapped with community service or something on the same level, which she could deal with, but —

_But a felony?_

Felony.

_FELONY!_

_Has this gotten back to Columbia already?_

"Ms. Montgomery, how do you plea?" the judge asked, looking down at her from where she stood into the courtroom.

"Not guilty, Your Honour."

She blacked out for most of the arraignment thereafter. All she could do was stare at the varnished banister in front of her and in previous day's clothes as her surroundings swarmed around her.

_Not guilty. Felony. Not guilty. Confession._

She could hear gasps and whispering behind her. She could hear her attorney, throwing _"lawyery"_ terms that just flew over her head. She could hear the prosecutor doing the same and the ruffling of papers, or _'notices'_ , that were being passed on to the judge.

_"One-Ninety-Fifty"_

_"CROSS-One-Ninety-Fifty"_ — which she later learned that it simply meant that the defense lawyer would be reserving the defendant's right to testify before the Grand Jury.

And she could hear the judge and his questions and she could see him reviewing her file and the notices. But nothing was registering in her head, nothing was making any sense because — _Class B Felony?_

She's on the same boat as homicide and armed robbery and rape and a class up would be capital punishment.

Because apparently drug _distribution_ , a _C Felony_ , can be elevated to a _Class B_ when you _attempt_ to _"sale"_ on school grounds, a school bus, or a child day care or an education facility or grounds or public areas within a thousand feet of them.

_Just her luck._

Because she was arrested in Brooklyn on a beautiful fall afternoon and was then, taken to the local precinct, the 73rd, where she was subsequently processed, fingerprinted, photographed, interrogated — unfairly, in her opinion — _whatever happened to due process_ _?_

And about six hours later, she was transported to central booking, where they, ten women at a time, were hooked up to a chain gang. And like her, they too weren't pleased to be there at all.

They were slightly scary, honestly, and she really tried her best not to rub shoulders with anyone.

Once they arrived at central booking, beneath the courthouse, they were led down various hallways when finally, they were individually unhooked from the chain so that they could be processed, fingerprinted, and photographed once again. After that, they were placed in various cells.

Her cell, about 15 of them were seemingly normal, slightly friendly, slightly chatty yet tired women. Some old. Mostly young. There was a metal toilet in the back corner that had two three foot tall block on the sides for some semblance of privacy. It was also bright and freezing cold despite the very pleasant temperatures outside.

The two cells that she could see were across from her and a little wider, but most definitely, kind of rowdy. Most of the people in those two cells were younger and seemingly had been there before.

It was easy to recognise the first-timers from the jailbirds.

After a little while, someone came around to question her. She asked basic personal questions, also about what she did for work, where she graduated, and her family background too — she assumed it had something to do with her bail.

At that time, it was probably a little past eleven in the evening already and more people kept getting put into the cramped cells. She could the cells across from her and they were causing a lot of problems, such as smoking when cigarettes obviously weren't allowed, and the guards kept threatening to shut off their in-cell pay phones.

Still, she couldn't get ahold of anyone, not Archer, not Savvy, not Derek and Mark — it was the same in precinct when they finally allowed her a phone call. At probably around twelve in the very very early morning was when Mark finally picked up their home phone.

_"Addison, you're in jail?" he asked, sounding genuinely shocked, "Amy was arrested as well. What the hell happened?"_

_"I — I don't even know, Mark. Just — I need your help." she said quickly since she only had around two minutes._

_"Yeah. Anything."_

_"I need you to get hold of Archer — I couldn't; he's not picking up — and tell him to get me a lawyer, so I can get out of here. I really need to pee, Mark."_

_"Then, go pee." he said it as though it was the most logical answer._

_"I can't. There are people around. Like ... twenty. And it's gross." she whined._

_"Okay. Okay. Hang in there. Don’t pee yourself. You don’t wanna be that person. I'll get Derek and we'll get hold of your brother."_

And that was how she spent her night in jail.

There weren't any space to sit on the two benches there, one was occupied by a woman who was sleeping it off, and the other was already full when she got here. So, she slid down the wall when her legs couldn't take it anymore, palm resting on something wet, and she sat on the floor with her legs tucked close to her chest and on the verge of crying because she really needed the bathroom.

And proper bathroom with a stall and a door and a latch.

She had come to learn that due process is basically irrelevant. The people who go through the booking process haven't even been convicted of anything. Yet, they're treated like convicted criminals and held in custody for extended periods of time.

At nine in the morning, she heard that a court would open up and arraignments would start. People were called out a few at a time and taken up to the court room. By five, another court opened up and things supposedly moved faster. At that point, she stopped being hopeful that she'd be called next. She just had to wait until she was called like everyone else.

At one point a junkie was put in her cell and just laid on the floor for a few hours before being taken out again, which she thought was unfair because she literally had been there for almost a day already.

At another point a really nice and talkative and amusing girl was brought in; she turned herself in for a warrant.

The two cells across from her were actually kind of amusing at times. They were making a deal for cigarettes between the two cells which was orchestrated by a woman in her cell since they couldn't see each other, but the amusement was short lived as she remembered where she was and she would rather not be there at all.

She was finally called at around half past seven in the evening, which was great because the court shuts down for the night at 12:30 or 1am and with her luck, she really thought she'd have to stay there for another day.

Once she was called she was led to a holding area behind the court where she was yet again held in a cell and there, she finally met with her lawyer.

At this point and most of the time, lawyers don't even know what the charges were. Just as you, they go in blind.

_"Don't speak. Don't say a word. I will speak on your behalf." her lawyer stressed, "Speak when you are spoken to. This is not a trial or an evidentiary hearing. No witnesses are called in. No evidence is received. I know you may feel the urge to express your side of the story but, listen to me, that would do more harm than good for your case. Trust me. Alright?"_

She nodded. He was the expert.

After her pre-arraignment hearing with her lawyer, she was finally called out of the hold tank.

_"Docket number nine-two-C-R-five-three-five-zero-one. People versus Addison Montgomery ..."_

Once the scurrying around with paperwork was completed, the judge asked the prosecutor about bail. "We request that the defendant's bail be set at $8,000 and because of the written confession by Miss Shepherd, an _Order of Protection_ should be issued against the defendant."

It was her lawyer’s turn to speak then.

At this point, she already felt even more like hell, she hadn't slept, she felt itchy and sticky in her own clothes and skin. And she needed to get home as fast as possible so she could use the bathroom, shower and then, eat a whole cow.

Her bail was set at $5,000 and an Order of Protection was issued.

 _Good_. Because she felt like she could actually strangle Amy right now.

* * *

Their cell door slid shut for the night. The sound of the electronic lock clicking into place was extremely loud.

It was dim-ish in the cell, more bright then dim, actually, due to the lights from the main area seeping through the bars.

"You, uh, okay with the," she waved a hand at the bunk, jaw clenching.

"Fine," her roommate said, still standing by the door. This was their first conversation and it couldn't have been more awkward.

They stood in silence until Addison blurted out her own name. Her cellmate extended her hand and Addison managed to shake it without doing anything else to antagonise her. "Torres. Calliope Torres," Torres said. "I am sure we will get on just fine."

Her hand was warm and dry, and her nails are clean and neatly trimmed. Her grip was firm, but she didn't try to crush her hand, like one of the other girls had early.

And she wasn't sure if that was sarcasm or not.

"Umm," she said to fill the silence that fell between them, "You can call me Addison."

"Okay, Callie, then. Torres is fine too," she said, finally moving into the cell and sitting down at the minuscule desk. "I get a lot of mail," she said pointedly, and Addison heard the warning in there — _don't stick your nose where it isn't wanted if you want to keep it —_ and the dismissal.

The next morning, when they were let out for breakfast, Addison tried not to be too obvious about sticking close to Torres until she went to sit with her crowd and Addison felt too much of an intruder to invade their space so she went to sit with the girl she came here with.

Torres didn't seem to notice her presence, or her absence, and the one thing she noticed about her was that she moved through the halls like it was her own idea, and not because she was being moved along the hallways by prison guards.

_Interesting._

When lights out were called at ten at night, she was led back to her barrack from ... what can only be called as _'prison orientation'_ and it was the oddest orientation she'd had ever attended. She got herself ready for bed and then, clambered up onto the top bunk and lay on her back, staring at the cinderblock ceiling. Inmates had scraped their initials into the paint. She traced her fingers over the gang signs and crude drawings of genitals.

She spent her entire second night in prison staring at the ceiling, awake; she couldn't sleep. She thought that maybe if she could cry it out, it would help, but there was nothing in her. She was tired, she was scared, and she got years to go.

She missed her old life so much her guts cramped with longing.

* * *

Idle time is the devil's playground.

It's true. At least, in prison, it is true.

All she has is her thoughts and time and when you have too much of those in here, it could drive even the most sane and strongest of people to the brink of madness.

_You. Your thought. And your mistakes and decisions._

It's a dangerous playground.

She contemplates her existence a lot in SHU.

Outside of solitary confinement, she tries her best to keep busy, whether it'd be by working or reading or writing in her journal, or even conversing with some of the girls who could tolerate her face. She just really needed to do something so she could take herself away from herself and her thoughts.

She would take up raking the fields to being confined to her own personal hell, her thoughts, any day.

Because being in solitary confinement is terrifying. But being in solitary confinement whilst pregnant is on another level of terrifying. The longer she's locked in here, the more days passes on, the more her fears are cementing and coming true; that she'd have her baby in this dirty old cell and that they won't care at all if she does.

They had thrown out the key and had forgotten all about her.

Pregnancy has made her paranoid, or maybe it's because she's in prison and she's in survival mode, or that she's in isolation and slowly losing her mind, or a combination of all three. Regardless, she will not eat the food they bring her. It could be laced, it could be poisoned; they don't want her to have the baby.

They don't care about her or her baby and she doesn't know what they've done to the food before bringing it to her, so, no, she will not eat it.

To the staff, she is just another face, another number — _711549_ — who managed to get herself knocked up.

She had just a little while ago complained to the guard that she felt sick. Her response was, "Get used to it."

And she supposes she should _'get used to it'_ but she really needed to see a doctor. She needed to see if her baby is alright.

She doesn't know how long she has to stay here but what she does know is that she won't put her baby in harm's way any more than she already has. She's already done just that by being in prison.

* * *

On her two week mark, she heard Meredith whispering _(hardly. She knew she was listening.)_ to her posse about her, and making blatant threats, _proposals,_ perhaps, from wanting to make her her prison wife, to beating — and she quote — the shit out of her with a _lockinasock_ because she was Satan's mistress.

 _"You should beat the red out of that hair,"_ is what one of the girls said next.

She asked herself then, what is this _lockinasock_ that they want to beat her with. She must have had heard them incorrectly because if it was what she thought it was ... she needed to tell somebody.

_Would she be snitching, then? Does it count as snitching if she's in fear for her life?_

She asked her cellmate that night when the lights were out. The term was being thrown around in the barrack a lot lately and she needed to know what exactly it is they'd use to beat the Satan out of her.

And her explanation was simple, it's a _lock_ in a _sock_. Very literal to its title. "It's a padlock stuffed in a sock and they beat you with it till you're black and blue and bloody and unconscious ..." Torres explained before adding, "Don't go to the showers tomorrow."

"What?"

She knew what she meant.

"Just trust me."

"But I — I didn't do anything." she said, panicked.

"You _rejected_ Meredith Grey, Montgomery. I guess you really haven't heard of her. You can't blame her, though."

She recalled her last encounter with Meredith Grey. It was her second twenty-four hours in prison and they were at chow hall for dinner. Meredith was tables away from her but she felt her lingering gaze the whole time and all of a sudden, a note was passed to her. She discreetly opened it, making sure that the guard hadn't caught her, before reading it herself — _711549, would you be my girlfriend?_

_What is this? High School?_

_No_. She wrote back. She didn't want a girlfriend. She didn't need protection. _Sorry,_ she added to soften the blow.

That night, Torres had told her that she had made the gravest mistake in her life by rejecting Meredith Grey, and that no one had ever done so.

_"How'd you know?" she questioned, wondering just how Torres knew about the letter and her answer. She hadn't told anyone about the note and her reply._

_"It's prison. Everyone's all up in everyone's business."_

And that was when she was told that Meredith was in for _murder_. She had chopped her girlfriend up in pieces and threw them around town.

If that piece of information was rallied to her earlier, she probably wouldn't have rejected Meredith Grey. _(No. She actually likes her limbs. She thinks they are her best assets.)_ But then again, she had chopped up her girlfriend into pieces, whom she must have loved and cared for to some degree, so she was caught between a rock and a hard place.

"That doesn't make any sense," she shook her head as she raked her fingers through her hair. It was sticky and oily and her hair still smell like that awful lice shampoo. She hadn't showered in three days and had planned to ... and that was when she gasped, she knew — Meredith knew she would be going to the showers tomorrow. "I mind my own business so I don't get involved with other people's problems."

"Exactly. You think you're better than everybody else because you're so smart and you think you have a strategy."

_Her strategy?_

Avoiding anyone and everyone as possible. But of course, reciprocating that same kindness and respectfulness if inmates showed her any. Because by avoiding, she believed that she will not get involved in anyone's issues or, in anyone's mess and fights. _(Clearly, it isn't working.)_ All she wanted was to get out of here early and not lose any of her gain time by getting into fights over ... nothing but ego and pride.

_(She is losing gain time now that she's in solitary confinement. Derek must be so worried.)_

"But I don't think that." she said, quietly.

Torres turned around to look up at her, leaning back in the chair so she didn't have to crane her neck. "They do," she said, "You need to stop Grey before she stops you for good."

* * *

She asked Torres about _it_ a few nights after their kiss. _What did it mean when you kissed me? Or I kiss you?_ "Am I your _bitch_ now?"

Torres was drinking water from the sink at that moment and spat, sprayed it all across the wall at her question. She was certain that the sink water was the same water that came out of the flush. "Did you just say ' _bitch'_? It sounds so wrong coming out of your mouth, Connecticut." she chuckled.

"Why? I say bad words, too." Addison said in her defence, rolling onto her side, the side where if she rolled just a few inches too much to the left, she'd be met with gravity, face first.

"The fact that you call them bad words is cute."

She laughed and they both laughed until it was quiet again. "And the answer to your question is no, you’re not my bitch," she pouted, "I'm not gonna be like Grey and force you into doing something you don't wanna ... unless you wanna, of course."

"I have a boyfriend."

"So? Gay for the stay."

She shook her and told her that she was flattered but she needed to focus on getting out because dating in prison is just way too much drama. She'd only been here a couple of days and she knew that already.

Maybe if she had fifty years, she'd reconsider.

"Thanks for helping me the other day," Addison said in a sincere voice. "I owe you big time."

"Nah. It's alright. I just felt bad for you. You were a mess, Montgomery. Puking everywhere. You kept saying some dude's name and I just needed you to shut up," she replied, and Addison snorted out a laugh.

"You know, not everybody is as nice as me, okay."

_(She knows that.)_

* * *

Almost four days had passed since she got here and money still hadn't been credited into her account. She had been starving for the past days, only going into chow hall in the mornings for coffee, at least that was somewhat decent here, to the point of almost fainting a couple of times today.

She was just so afraid of the food. Everything about it was questionable. She questioned the sanitation of both the workstation, the produce itself and the inmates who would be cooking their meals. She questioned the freshness of the foods. She heard that they would even serve expired canned food and foods that were going bad.

She didn't want to be ingesting that.

She didn't plan on dying in prison because both ways — eating and not eating the food would and could have killed her, so she dragged herself from her bed one evening to line up, so they could be taken to the chow hall.

_(A quarter of her time here is to wait in lines.)_

Once it was her turn, she picked up her tray and sat down on the first empty spot she could find and chow down on her dinner like it was the most delicious plate of food she'd ever eaten.

It was not good. But it was not atrocious, either. It was bland but it would service.

She looked at her food ... well, it blended in with the beige coloured tray. There was plain pasta with some sort of sad mock meat that she didn't even dare touch and a spoon of soggy peas on the side. She'd always liked carby, starchy, pasta on its own — it was Bizzy's _encouraging_ words and _great parenting_ that had stuck with her all throughout her teen years and it was why she had stopped carbs for good until now, that it _("a minute on the lips, forever on the hips"). So, eating just pasta after days of going hungry was actually quite delicious._

"Slow down, girl," the woman with crazy unruly hair in front of her said, "Don't yo mama ever taught you about manners?"

She just narrowed her eyes at her, blushing with embarrassment as she now slowly chewed the last of the food in her mouth, ignoring the girl completely.

She might have forgotten that she wasn't alone.

If Bizzy saw her like this, she'd be chastised immensely.

"What'd ya do to land yoself in here? Daddy stopped giving you allowance that ya had to shoplift from Macy's?" she chuckled and the girls around her laughed in succession.

"I don't shop at Macy's."

Her friends _oohed and aahed_ and gasped dramatically and it was the girls turn to blush crimson.

They ate in silence after that, no one asking her any more questions and everyone else minding their own business because they only had about three minutes to eat before they had to leave.

In prison, they feed them the minimum just to keep them alive. The minimum nutrition — their diets were not at all balanced and were heavily relied on carbs. There were no vegetables, other than mushy peas, and fruits because carbs are cheaper, carbs would fuel them for longer, and would also last longer in shelves. But too much of carbs would make oneself stuffed, literally.

She was going to have constipation for days, if not weeks, if she continued with this diet.

When the girl in front of her got up, the rest followed, leaving her behind with a couple of other women on the far end.

And that's when she saw the COs zig-zagged through the tables in their usual fashion to keep an eye on things but she didn't see it when a CO deliberately walked behind her when he saw her getting ready to stand up with her tray, and she bumped right into his solid chest.

Panic-stricken, she dropped her tray back down on the table, causing food and water to spill everywhere.

"Shit —" she gasped at the contact with the big burly man towering over her, who was probably a foot taller, definitely not expecting for anyone to be standing behind her.

"Watch it, _inmate_!" he shouted at her before she could open her mouth to apologise. She took a step back when he moved closer, his jaw was squared as he kept his cold, blue gaze set on her.

"I didn't know you —" she blabbered whilst trying to clean up the mess to take to the trash.

"Then, keep a fucking eye out, _inmate_ ," he spoke lowly.

 _Inmate_ , that word was starting to irritate her.

"Okay. But _you_ came up behind me ..." she stopped when she saw another guard — Trent, it read on his badge — coming up on her other side and interrupting her attempt at explaining herself, speaking loud enough for the whole hall to hear.

"Section 187," he said, "Interfering with a staff member in the performance of duties. That's a shot, _inmate_." Her eyes dashed to Officer Trent, his body was just as big and burly, his eyes just as sharp. The brunette looked as menacing as the blond and her eyes darted from one guard to the other, watching them smile and smirk as she finally understood what was going on.

They were just having some _fun_. Entertainment. Her life was their game. It was orchestrated, purposeful and planned. They were enjoying this, having fun in scaring her, picking on the newbie, and so, she bit down on her tongue as she told herself to not give them what they wanted.

They wanted to break her and she wondered how the hell was she going to handle this kind of treatment for the rest of her time here.

CO Trent disrupted her thoughts, then. "Move it, _inmate_. And clean up this fucking mess." She went about to do just that when one of them put a hand on her shoulder, halting her movements. "Yes, _Sir_ ," he said, emphasising on the last word.

Narrowing her eyes up at them, she swallowed hard, digging her nails into her palm.

Again, she had never been as mortified as she was at that moment.

"Yes. _Sir_ ," she said in between teeth.

"That wasn't so bad, was it?"

"It's like pulling teeth with your lot, sometimes."

She averted her eyes when both of them passed her to move on with their supervision of dinner. But they continued watching her as she cleaned up the mess in haste and threw away the trash.

CO Trent, now planted by the doors, she kept her gaze ahead, not daring to make any eye contact with the asshole when she passed him.

"Better watch out, _inmate_ ," he said, making her freeze midway. "Never know when someone's behind your back."

She couldn't help but think there was an underlying threat to his words.

* * *

No one can be trusted in prison. Not even the correctional officers.

But — sure, not all of them are assholes, most are on some kind of fucking power trip, getting high off testosterone, or they had a bad day at home with their wife and of course, it makes sense that they're their personal punching bags.

She gets it, okay, but that doesn't mean they should get the brunt of it.

And it is the same for the inmates, not all of them are cold and calculated and heartless criminals.

There is this one guard, though, who had so far been nice to her. His name is Alex Karev and he calls her by her name. Not _inmate._ He's polite and respectful. An asshole to everyone else but her. _Interesting_. He doesn't get too aggressive or suggestive with the pat-downs and for the most part, he isn't so bad to look at. He looks like someone she could be friends with back at home.

And that begs the question whether she'd jeopardise her relationship with Derek for Officer Karev and to that, it's a no.

A hard no.

She's not here for that.

All she'd been doing was talk to the officer — maybe, a little too friendly for an officer-inmate relationship — but she was never the one who sought him out.

He makes small talk when he comes to give her her mail, doesn't tease her of its content _(all mail is opened and checked for contraband and occasionally for security reasons, like she said there is no such thing as privacy in prison.)_. He was the one who called her out from a crowd of inmates one morning, who would come up to her like a lost puppy sometimes in outdoor rec, who would bring her his favourite books for her to read.

He can be quite sweet. Just to her, she noticed.

She doesn't mind the attention, in fact, she kind of enjoys it.

If he has a motive, she doesn't really mind it that much, because she has one too. Because it doesn't hurt to have at least one officer who treats her like she's human and not garbage. It sure is nice to not be yelled at all the time, to be insulted, taunted and talked to in a condescending manner. And it helps her too at her 'job' out on the grounds, especially when the sun is scorching and burning at her skin and when she just needs the shade for a minute or five.

But the other inmates, of course, thinks that she's either fucking him or is a snitch, when in fact, she is just reciprocating kindness.

If being nice to an officer helps her life to be a little bit easier in here, then, fuck what everyone has to say.

Torres tells her she's stupid for flirting. "It's us versus them, Connecticut. And besides, you have a boyfriend on the outside. You do remember him, don't you? His name is Derek."

She says she's only being practical.

Prison is survival after all.

She knows she shouldn't trust anyone in prison, and that includes Torres even though she's been nothing but kind to her since she's got here. She trusts her, regardless of what everyone has to say. Because everyone makes mistakes, choices that have changed _their_ futures. Some choices would even defined _them_ for life, and _they're_ all here, doing time to rectify just that.

And her mistake is being too trusting of the people she cares about, of being too helpful and giving. Because if she had just stayed at home and not picked up Amy, she wouldn't be here right now.

Addison got through almost a whole month without any real trouble.

One evening, as she was sitting with her back to the wall, legs crossed, reading the book Karev had given her yesterday, when an alarm like nothing she had ever heard before went off.

Her _cellie_ had come scurrying into their shared accommodation right before the blaring started, and ran straight to the toilet. She watched as she pushed down on the latch for the flush, then a couple more times, more aggressively, but still, nothing happens.

" _Fuck_." Torres cried, running her hands over her face. "Fuck. Fuck. Fuck ..." she cursed some more and kicked at the wall.

"What's going on?"

It was then Torres jumped, turning around to look up at her like she'd only just noticed her.

"There's ahh — there's a _sweep_ ," she said whilst tidying up her area, "Someone must have gotten caught." she shrugged, explaining, "It could be anything from an OD to getting caught with contraband. And we're all going down."

"They're searching our cells?"

"Yeah. Give me your shit and stand outside the bunk." Addison hurried to get down from her bed and she glanced outside to see a few other girls on the opposite cells trying desperately to flush just as Torres had.

"I don't have anything," she said, words unclogging from her throat, figuring she was speaking of contraband. _Drugs_. And it clicked it her head then, it was drugs that Torres and a lot of the girls were trying to flush down the toilet.

_So, the flush had stopped working._

They must have turned off the system or something.

"Good," she said, grabbing her arm in passing, and pulling her to stand on the outside of the bunk bed. "Stand there and be quiet."

She placed her on one side before standing on the other. She was unsure of what to do when CO Trent came barging in, looking just as flagrant as everyone else. And she felt a shiver run down her spine when he made eye contact with her, or she made eye contact with him.

The sheer size of the man was intimidating enough. To then add the authority he has over them and his outright contempt for her, made it hard to disguise the shiver as anything other than fear.

She didn't show it. Or she tried not to, at least. But before she knew it she was being pulled and pushed and she was slammed right into one of the four walls.

"Hey! What the fuck?" she heard Torres shout.

A searing pain shoot through her head, then. The officer had grabbed a hold of her hair and re-slammed her face-first against the cement wall with a loud thud.

And she heard herself shout, then. High and desperate.

 _I didn't do anything. Please. I swear!_ She tried to scream but nothing voiced.

Officer Trent breathed heavily, drawing mouthfuls of air and she felt it exhaling against her ear again and again. She cried out in pain as she was being manhandled, quickly grabbing a hold of his arms and hands to try and pry him off, but he wouldn't budge. It was like trying to move steel bars holding her in place.

"Stop resisting or I'm gonna write you a shot for disobeying a direct order, _inmate_." he said harshly and slammed her back against the wall again, keeping his voice somewhat down as to not draw attention from anyone who might be passing.

She finally stopped trying to push him off.

"You face the wall and if I see you peeking for even one second, I'll rip your eyes out. Do you understand?" The question was rhetorical but she nodded frantically none the less.

The officer was clearly in a state of anger and frustration and clearly taking it out on her.

Gasps of air were falling from her mouth uncontrollably now, as he let go of her hair and she fell slack against the wall, still facing it as threatened. She tried her best to calm herself down but she found it impossible right now.

_How can she when she's terrified and all she wants is to crawl into a corner and cry?_

"Where's the stash? Maria was dumb enough to OD on your shit —"

"They're your drugs, not mine."

But what he seemed to forget is that she could hear everything that was going on. She might not be able to see, but she could listen.

_So, Torres is a pusher._

"You sold it to her."

"But you brought it in. You forced me to sell."

"Yeah, I'm sure they'll believe an inmate over an officer — they've got the dogs. Now, open wide."

"Fuck no."

She could hear Torres pleading and begging with him now. She wanted to turn around and see what he was doing to her but she couldn't.

She couldn't.

She can't turn into a pillar of salt, as Lot's wife had.

She couldn't do anything. She had to take his word for it, that he'd rip her eyes out one way and she believed he actually could and would.

"I know what happens if that opens up in my stomach. I die!"

"A lot of shit in prison can kill you, Torres."

She felt helpless to help her, especially when she could hear the sound of a rubber snapping and Torres struggling and grunting. So, she drowned out the sounds and focused on the commotion outside.

She watched as the officers outside made a mess of the bunks in the cells, holding true to the phrase _'tossing cells'_ as they search for contraband. The rattle and clinking of metal and plastic hitting the floor and the ripping of packages were making her jump every time they throw something new onto the floor like it didn't cost a penny, and she watched as instant noodles and biscuits and coffee grinds fly here, there and everywhere in between.

The officer kept his sharp eyes set on her as he leaves.

She turned back around when Officer Asshole was out of sight, she had never seen her roommate look so pale and drained before. But before she could say anything to her, it was their turn for the sweep.

"This is a mandatory inspection. We need to thoroughly search your cell for contraband." Karev said, before walking in with a dog to begin the search.

She could see Karev trying to catch her eyes, but she was not in the mood for any of that right now.

She was bruised. Her roommate and her only friend in this hell could possibly die. Their cell was about to look like a tornado had run through it and they were going to spend the entire night cleaning it all up.

Once they were done and coming back empty, Torres gave her a worried glance when they started to clear up the mess.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

That's a stupid question.

Nodding, "Yeah, I'll be fine," her cellmate said and with shaky hands, she watched as she started to put everything back to where it belonged.

"Maybe you should sit down. I can clear this up on my own."

"It's fine."

"The more you move, the more the acid in your —"

"I said it's fine, Connecticut. Just let it go." she said, voice sounding almost resigned, as she tried to brush off the footprints on her sheets before making the bed the way it was prior to the onslaught.

She made quick work of cleaning everything and making her bed all over again. Another level of realisation hit her of how much longer would it be before she'd become the next drug hiddie-hole.

Officer Trent could make her time here a living hell and there was absolutely nothing she could do about it.

"Okay," she said.

There was not much else to say.

* * *

They were in lockdown for the next three days and had to stay in their cells like caged animals _(even when the DOJ guidelines specifically says that inmates SHOULD get an hour of indoor and outdoor recreational activity each day, she still have the stupid booklet they gave them in orientation as proof.)_ with the flush still turned off.

She didn't see the sun for a whole week after.

She had prematurely thought nothing could get any worse since she was already in prison, and this had to be as worse as it could get, but — boy, was she wrong.

Being in a twelve by ten feet cell with no sunlight and the flush out of order in the whole barrack, not only there's, was by far the worst.

She would rather take the abuse by the guards to being cooped up in their cells with privileges revoked because that means no rec time, indoor or outdoor, no shower time, no visitation, no phone time, no going anywhere past their bars.

Their meals were brought to them. Three cold stale, bare minimum meals.

Torres said she was fine but of course, she wasn't fine. She was freaking out, afraid that the drugs would rupture in her stomach or get stuck in her intestinal track and eventually, kill her. Addison helped her calm down, as Torres had on her first night here, until the drugs finally came out on the other end.

She had to pretend that day never happen. Actually, she had to pretend a lot of days didn't or else she wouldn't be able to keep her sanity in this place.

_(It's all she has left.)_

* * *

_**Hey, guys! Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed! How do you like Addison in prison so far? More of Derek will be coming soon. Please leave a review and let me know what you think.** _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No, I have never gone to prison.


	4. Chapter 4

**Out of Sight, Out of Mind**

_**Chapter Four** _

_"Many people in prison are not inherently bad people, just people that have made bad decisions. Like drink and drive and unfortunately, kill someone"_

* * *

When a detective wants to speak with you, wants to hear your side of the story, do not believe that they will.

Even though you feel like you should talk, always remember, _**NEVER**_ speak to police. Because innocence doesn't matter.

You can scream, _**I AM INNOCENT**_ , on the top of your lungs, and it still wouldn't matter to them.

Tell the truth. Tell a lie. Say a little or say a lot. Innocent, guilty, or somewhere in between. It doesn't matter to the police.

The police wants to speak with you because they already think you did it.

If one ' _witness'_ says she saw you commit a crime, that it was yours and not at all hers and you were _selling_ it to her, the police have enough evidence to charge you with possession and distribution. It doesn't matter if the witness is your mortal enemy; if the witness has a financial motive to falsely accuse you; if she's a known liar; if she's your boyfriend's little sister.

Because what most people don't know is that under New York State Law, when the police lawfully pulls you over, they may, under certain circumstances, lawfully search the vehicle and, in some cases, its passengers.

Because New York State Law has what's known as a _"Presumption of Possession"_ for drugs or weapons within a motor vehicle. This means that when police finds an illegal substance in a car — every single person in that car can be arrested, charged, brought to trial and/or convicted based upon the recovery of the illegal drug or weapon within the car.

No matter how innocent you are, no matter how charming and persuasive you try to be — you won't talk your way out of getting arrested.

So don't, under any circumstances, speak with police without having a lawyer _physically_ present in the same room with you. Because being present is the only way your lawyer can cover your mouth with his or her hands to prevent you from speaking.

Keep your lips sealed. Don't give a written statement either. Don't shake your head _'yes'_ or ' _no'_ , or use any other body language.

Your words are extremely valuable. Keep them to yourself. Never speak to police. Use your constitutional right to remain silent. _Always!_ No exceptions.

But sometimes that can bite you in the ass, like it did her, because while she remained silent, demanded a lawyer, Amy went ahead and wrote a whole statement.

Because the police will lie.

Solving crime is hard work and the NYPD has lots of crimes on their plate already and theirs is just another drug possession on a Tuesday afternoon.

For the detective who interrogated Amy, perhaps the temptation to ' _solve'_ the case — by saying that her friend is in their ratting her out, but if she wrote up a statement _first_ , then, maybe she could walk out free of charge ... — is irresistible. And for the minor too who was more afraid of her mother than the police.

* * *

> _Dear Addison,_
> 
> _How are you?_ _I'm not doing so well myself. It's been a week now and I miss you so much. I think about you all the time —_

  
Setting the letter down, Addison sighed. She honestly had no idea what she was doing or why she kept doing it — constantly read Derek's letters couldn't be good for her.

The exhaustion of the day was finally setting in, limbs relaxing, but not too much _(she is still in prison after all)_ , and her mind began to grow fuzzy. She leaned back in the creaking chair, rubbing at her eyes. Apparently doing nothing all day long could just be as tiring as juggling medical school with a part-time job as a tutor and still have somewhat of a social life.

The last time she tutored, it was SAT chemistry, and look where she is now.

It had been almost a whole month since she got here and she had managed to stave off trouble/fights so far. However, she had not been appointed a work placement as of yet, which at this point, is kind of a thwart. She would gladly and willingly accept janitorial duties — _okay, wait_ , maybe she's not that desperate to get out of her cell or out of her thoughts, or the noisy, overcrowded barracks, where everyone's just basically breathing each other's stinky breaths. But she really wanted to do something — keep busy so she don't go crazy.

Some women opt to not get placed in jobs at all. Some couldn't because of their charges and the crimes they committed. Because working is a privilege here. You are trusted to hold a knife and not stab someone. You are trusted to take control and be in charge and not start a coup. You are trusted with tools and to not sneak it out of the room.

And that was what's frustrating about being a prisoner, you either have no control of your life or just an illusion of it until it shatters into pieces right in front of your face and you remember — _hey, I'm in prison._

Some people here don't change at all and do the same exact thing they were doing on the outside. The only thing changed was their _location_.

_(There's everything and much much more in here, things she's never heard of — and by everything, she means drugs.)_

She chose to try to keep busy, whether it be writing in her journal or reading at the library _(fun fact: the library is where most 'transactions' take place, and the showers halls as well)_ , because then, she would be out of the latest drama, the latest fights. But some arguments were unavoidable, inevitable even, and sometimes it involved her.

Because apparently, she has a pretty unlikeable and detestable face? Whatever that means. She knew they were just taunts to bring her down but it was every single day that someone was telling her to her face that her nose was too big or that the mole there was disgusting or that she had a man jaw and it became increasingly difficult to not take their words to heart and see something fundamentally wrong with her face. She knew she wasn't drop-dead gorgeous like Monica Bellucci but she had always thought she was somewhat ... alright ... passable, even.

And so, she asked Torres about it one day, "Is there something wrong with my face?"

"What kinda question is that?" she chuckled, looking up at her, then, back at her book, "Is this your way of fishing for compliments?"

"It's just that everyone keeps saying that they hate my face and I'm starting to see why."

"God, Montgomery." Torres exhaled, exasperated, and she slammed her book down, "Weren't you ever teased in high school?"

"You can't be teased if no one knows you exist." she said, remembering how she had felt as a fifteen year old.

"I don't know what's sadder."

_Would anyone even notice her gone? Would anyone care?_

She was so invisible that she literally blended in with the walls.

"You are beautiful," Torres said.

Suddenly, she was sitting next to her. Their faces were very close, and then, she felt it, the tickle of her breath against her cheek and she ceased wondering anything.

"They're just jealous because you've got great hair and great skin." Her response brought the first smile, albeit small, and she was mesmerised anew. She wanted Torres to keep smiling, and so she added, "I think you're beautiful, too."

Callie's smile deepened, and Addison watched the creases that grew in the corner of her eyes and around her mouth. It seemed to smooth some of her sharp edges when she smiled, and Addison felt herself slightly soothed.

"You don't have to flatter me, Montgomery. I already know I'm beautiful."

_(She wishes she has her confidence.)_

* * *

Prison was beginning to be too much for her, she didn't like the repetitiveness of it, they were locked into their cells at nine and out at five, didn't like that she was living in a box, didn't like that she had no control over her person, and she didn't know how much longer she could handle all this.

Because she was still waking up every morning not believing she was in prison and wishing this to just be a really bad fucking nightmare.

> _Dear Addison,_
> 
> _How are you? So, I got yelled at Professor Bunch's class today ... I miss you so much. I think of you all the time and I actually don't know what to do anymore. I can't eat or sleep. I can't concentrate in class because I'm so worried about you ... I don't know if I even want to be a doctor anymore ... I would really like to see soon, Addison, or at least hear your voice again. I have been waiting for your call every night ..._
> 
> _I love you. Forever._
> 
> _Yours truly,_
> 
> _Derek_

  
Addison couldn't take it anymore. Tears were starting to form in her eyes, and her hands were shaking. _How could Derek be questioning his future?_ She missed him too and even though, she had already been approved for phones calls three weeks ago, she had not picked it up to call Derek.

She had called Archer and had talked to Bizzy but it was ready hard for her to punch in his phone number; she didn't know what to say to him. Because she knew herself — once she hears his voice, she'd be inconsolable.

And prison should never see your weakness.

And Derek is hers.

What if she made an enemy and that person caught a glimpse of his address from her mail and got someone on the outside to hurt him, demand Derek for money in retaliation — people do horrible things to each other all the time and for far much less.

She knew what these people were capable of.

They were in prison for a reason.

Pushing the letter away, she replaced it with a can of coke and chips. The off brand kind. She'd been eating so much junk food every night before going to sleep for the past couple of day, which she'd never done before. And truly, it was only making her feel even more bloated and down on herself.

But she was always hungry nowadays. So hungry that she could eat a cow.

It was probably because the serving size for chow was the bare minimum required to keep them alive.

Now, she was munching on potato chips and wishing they had the family size in commissary and trying her best not to think of the free outside world.

She tried not to think about Derek and what he'd be doing right about now — it was almost eleven o'clock _(they sell these little overpriced digital clocks in commissary)_ , so, on a good day, they'd be curled up on the couch watching reruns of Law and Order. Maybe he was studying like he should be and not writing her another goddamn letter.

Mark should be out with his new flavour of the week for about three hours tops before he'd take her to his shared apartment and be inconsiderate all night and all morning long.

Oh — and she remembered this one time when she was going to the bathroom, she bumped into a mint chocolate chip in the middle of the morning; the girl literally had pastel green hair, and was about to make her walk of shame exit.

_"Oh, sorry. Umm. Hi —"_

_"Hi. I'm — yeah, I'm gonna go — Oh, do you wanna share a cab or something?"_

_"Share a — oh, no, I'm not a one-night stand. No offense. I'm dating Mark's roommate."_

_"Who's Mark?"_

_"Mark. The guy you just slept with. Mark."_

_"He said his name was Eric."_

It was awkward to say the least.

"So, you still haven't written back?" Torres's voice broke her out of her reverie and she turned around to the sound of her voice.

She was sitting on her own bed, on the bottom bunk, with a book and pen in her hand, which she knew was a front for _'the books'_ , as she assiduously wrote down who owed her what and how much.

Clearing her throat, "Ahh — No." she said.

"Why not?"

"I don't know."

"Are you angry at him?"

She didn't answer right away, she stopped to think how they had left it between them. She didn't think there was any ground to be angry at him. They didn't left in bad terms. He stayed the night, after having caught her almost escaping, they kissed and did more than that and she said goodbye that morning, having had no idea where they were going to ship her.

She glanced back up at her. "I'm not."

"Then, why don't you just write him back?" Torres deadpanned blithely, like it was the most practical question to ask next, "You're going to push him away, you know. He's out there, where it matters, and you're stuck in here. He can have any girl he wants, but — I'm assuming, because I don't know him — that he isn't." she looked up at her then, for confirmation of her assumption and Addison nodded in reply.

But she doesn't really know that. _Does she?_ But she knows Derek, she hoped.

"I'm sorry if the truth hurts but I'm just telling you how I see it because you guys are not tied down. You guys don't have a baby. But he's waiting for you. And trust me, most guys won't. Married or not. And that goes for women, too. He's writing you like fucking everyday, which means he's taking time in going to the post office every single day. He's loyal. He's devoted. Do you know how many girls in here would kill for a letter from their man? Their husbands? From family? Don't you know how lucky you are?"

She had never thought about it that way before. At mail call, it was just a few of them who'd get mail and she's the only one who get called one every single day.

"I mean I wish my family would writer me. They don't even bother anymore —" Torres stopped her just as she was about to sympathise with her cellmate, "Don't. Don't even start." she warned before continuing with her precursory question. "So, why don't you write him back?"

Addison shrugged a little, expression grim. "I guess I just ... I ... I don't know what to say."

There was literally nothing worth reporting back to him. Everything she'd like to say would only further worry him tenfold.

"Just tell him you _love_ him," she said, voice bored and eyes rolling at _'love_ '. She found herself smiling at Torres. "And how fucking shitty this place is."

She didn't want to worry him. But not replying to his letters would indefinitely worry him further.

Nodding, she told Torres that she would write him back once she gets stamps from commissary.

"So, how'd you guys meet? — and don't worry, I won't steal your man. He don't sound like my type anyway."

"We met in medical school in the campus library." The corner of her mouth lifted into the slightest fraction of a smile, the nostalgia of it all sweeping over her face. "He was pretending to work there so he could follow me around the library."

"That's fucking creepy."

"I think it's adorable." she counters, smiling.

She scoffed. "Oh, yeah, fucking adorable. White man following you around campus sure doesn't sound like an episode of Murder, She Wrote?"

Addison laughed. Truly actually laughed, which she hadn't in a very long time, going on seven months now, that her stomach hurt and coke nearly came out of her nose.

She told Torres more about Derek and their time together and she trusted her in telling her about her life and the kind of friends she had on the outside. She knew Torres wouldn't deceive her, even though she really didn't know much about her. All she knew was the Callie who was in prison and the person she was on the outside. She didn't know her that well. Actually, not at all.

"... then, I met his best friend, _Mark_ —"

"Mark. Okay. Now, that sounds like a name I'd mess with back in day."

Shaking her head, "Trust me," she said and Torres really should. She'd been a witness to his many hiccups and breakups, one even involving a bar brawl when the girl ran to her brothers because Mark had broken her heart and she understood where she was coming from because Archer would have done the same thing for her. "You don't want to be involved with a guy like Mark. I mean he's sweet and all but he's kind of a manwhore."

"Whoever said I'm looking to settle down. Your girl is just looking for a man who can touch her right. Eight years is a long time."

_Eight years._

Torres had been in prison for eight years.

_What in the world did she do?_

"Tell me more about this Mark character." Torres grinned, smiling from ear to ear like a Cheshire cat. She reminded her of a kid on Christmas morning, all giddy and excited for more.

"Like I said Mark can be sweet and all but he's also arrogant and a womaniser. He has these ocean blue eyes that when he looks at you, you feel trapped in them. He rides a motorcycle and wears this stupid leather jacket like it's the only jacket he owns. He shares a rundown studio apartment with Derek. He makes inappropriate jokes. He goes on parties and still get good grades. And he just knows exactly how to push my buttons. He makes me furious." she went quiet, realising that she was suddenly out of breath and that she missed him.

_Mark?_

"Hey?" she felt a kick to the chair she was sitting on then. Off her questioning look, Torres asked, "You okay?"

Eyes clouding over, she frowned. "Honestly?" she shook her head a little, "No."

"You miss that idiot, don't you?"

Addison gave a short, humourless laugh. "Didn't realise I would."

"Well, you care about him, that's why," before she could answer, though, something lit up in Torres's eyes. "Did he ever try to _trap you?"_

"What?" she said, slightly defensive.

For a long moment, Torres stared at her, silent and questioning, and Addison started to wonder if she knew something. But then, she shrugged and said, "Nothing."

And then, nothing else was said between them. The laughter they shared, nonexistent in this windowless ten by ten they now call home. Torres turned on her side, her back facing her, as she brought her paper thin blanket up under her chin, knees curled to her chest.

Addison was so utterly confused and that was probably an understatement because — _did she say something wrong or offensive?_

Callie had shut down and she didn't know why.

The tension was so thick and palpable in their cell that she felt it in her throat. She really didn't think she said something wrong and she almost asked if she did but thought otherwise.

Exhausted now, she went to climb up the steps to the top bunk and crawled under the covers. The barrack was still very much alive with inmates being thoughtless to those who wanted to sleep.

Some nights, it could be pretty impossible to fall asleep.

But still, she could hear the echoes and the swinging of the guards' boots clicking against the concrete floor as they walked by their cells.

They were both quiet until they weren't. "What did you do, Callie?" she asked, feeling impulsive.

"What, what did I do?"

"To land yourself here." she laid on her back now and stared at the ceiling.

For awhile they were quiet again; Addison had promised herself not to push her to talk about it if she didn't want to, because she knew of the unspoken rule — _one should never ask a fellow inmate what they were in for_ — so after awhile of her silence, she was about to give up once again and just try to get some sleep with all the noise and lights, when Torres said hesitantly, "Felony murder."

She frowned, taken aback a little. _Oh_. She didn't know what she was expecting to hear but definitely not that. She didn't know what to say now, regretting that she even asked in the first place.

Because in the state of New York, it doesn't matter if the death was intentional or accidental, or who did and did not do what.

Because if someone dies during a certain kind of felony and you happen to be there, how ever _'involved'_ you were, whether you were the getaway driver in a burglary gone terribly wrong or in a drug deal where someone gets shot and killed and you happen to be standing next to the person who pulled the trigger, your codefendant, your boyfriend, your so-called friends, you will be liable for murder as well.

"I took an open plea. If I'd taken it to trial and lost, I'd get life. I still remember what the judge said to me ... _'I do not believe that you are a threat to society, I believe that you were in fear for your life. I believe you made a bad choice, but you participated in armed robbery, someone's life was taken; ten to fifteen years.'_ Bang. And that was it. I can still feel his gavel rattling through me. It was like an out-of-body experience after that."

* * *

There is no way of escape in here.

Escapism in her mind, possible. But physically, no. At least she can't think of one.

When she was first brought in, the day of intake, when she climbed into new prison clothes and became **_711549_** — white underwear, white bra, white socks, white t-shirt, navy jumpsuit, they weren't at all in any conditions of brand new — and she was handed the essentials — bedclothes, underwear, bra, toilet paper — they were moved from door to door, around corners, through corridors, left turns and right turns, down the stairs, then, up the stairs, and through even more corridors.

She was lost already. She couldn't possibly find her way back to the lobby.

And they did that purposefully.

So, they would not be able to map out the blueprint of the prison in their heads. So, she would not be able to come up with an escape plan.

And honestly, the movie, _Escape From Alcatraz_ , have crossed her mind about a dozen and a half times every day.

Today, though, she actually _actually_ thinks if she could possibly escape.

Maybe with Callie's help, they could come up with something.

Oh, she thinks she could get a spoon out from the kitchen and dig her way out like they did in the movie.

The problem is that — one, she has no upper body strength to pull herself up the pipes; two, she isn't brave enough; three, she's pregnant.

And that's an added five to twenty years depending on the severity.

_Why risk her three years for twenty?_

She laughs at herself. Like she was even going to attempt.

But that's what happens to an idle mind in prison.

_You go stupid._

But she'd do anything to not have this baby in prison.

She can't even fathom, doesn't want to think about what will happen seven months from now.

She has the baby and then, _what happens next?_

The baby can't possibly stay with her until she is released, even if she'd prefer that non-existent option.

They'd take the baby away from her, she knows they will, they rip _her_ from her arms.

And at that thought, her heart sinks to the pit of her stomach, eyes starting to water and the back of her throat stings with bile for the fifth time today.

"Hey. You listening?" She hears the older women's voice, whom she had been talking to in secret through the vent for the past two weeks, so she wouldn't lose her mind to anarchy.

It helps a little, but not really.

Addison stares at her own ugly flat shoes. They don't have laces, she just realises. She's not sure if she's special, on suicide watch, or if no one gets laces in SHU. She can't muster up the energy to ask.

Her voice is trapped in her throat and she works her mouth several times before she manages to say, "Not really." It's barely breath, the illusion of sound, but _Grandma_ _(she cannot remember what she said her name was)_ seems to hear her anyway.

"First time, huh? Yeah, pregnancy can be a bit overkill. You gotta keep your head up though, sweetheart. Got a miracle from God growing inside you." Grandma chatters away and Addison lets it wash over her, soaks up the noise and the easiness that Grandma has.

It kind of reminds her of her own grandma.

* * *

When she got into the showers, she was immediately struck by how comfortable everyone was with getting naked. Women upon women were wandering around with everything on display, breasts and ass jiggling everywhere and she didn't know where the hell to look.

She's only ever showered really really early in the morning, just a couple of other newbies, some elderly and herself, at a time when no one should be awake.

It wasn't that she was so modest or such a prude, it was the fact that it was a lot of it happening all at the same time that was making her uncomfortable and shy. And to make matters worse, there were guards — male officers right outside, just there with a view of mountains and down under, watching them.

She was so disgusted and there was nothing she could do about it but go along.

It was what's normal.

"Oh, just get used to it, Montgomery," Torres laughed her croaky laugh, "There's not much time for shyness in prison."

Addison striped off with everyone else, holding her arms tightly across my chest. Funny how that was the area she protected, but in that moment, she just didn't want anyone to see her bare breasts.

The shower facilities were not in the least bit clean; it looked _showerable_ enough but she knew it was never ever going to be clean _clean_. How can it be when it's a communal and shared with almost a hundred girls, all needing to get cleaned up. That was why she always tries not to drop the soap and she finally got her money to purchase her own shower slippers.

She turned the knob for the shower and today, the water pressure was just enough that she could actually get her hair washed thoroughly. Though it was freezing cold as expected, she still let out a little yelp like she did every single time.

Just then, she felt a hand on her ass and she jumped a little, moving forward into the stream and getting water sprayed onto her face as she spluttered.

"Hey!" she called, grabbing onto the tiled wall, so she wouldn't slip, whirling around to see Meredith behind her.

"You workout?" Meredith leaned back against the long bench, dragging her eyes over her like she was a juicy steak.

"Something I can help you with, Grey?"

"I'm gonna make you an offer, sweetie. I don't usually let things like walking into me slide so easily but you're my type. I know Officer Trent is sniffing around you so why don't you come be with me and I can keep him away from you?"

"I'm already getting help for that," she motioned to Torres who was two showers down from her.

"Torres? Don't you know she's in with the enemy?" she snickered, "But I can also get you _things_ for a good time for an even better price. I heard what you're in for."

"Yeah. I don't know what to say to you, Grey," shrugging, "I guess, don't believe everything you hear." she said.

Meredith was getting more and more annoyed by the second and Addison could see that. She was going to make an enemy out of her if she didn't comply but whoring herself out to Meredith Grey, who had chopped up her girlfriend and scattered her pieces all over town, was a step too far when everything as is was so overwhelming already.

"One last chance," Meredith wagged a finger, "I'll never make this offer again."

"Sorry. I have to decline but thank you."

She tried to be polite at least. ( _Maybe her tone was a little patronising and rude.)_ No reason to be uncivilised; they'll be living here together for years to come.

Addison turned back to continue showering when she was shoved from behind. Her face slammed into the tiled wall and she slipped, going down hard on her knees. She couldn't see, and there was blood in her mouth. She was vaguely aware of her surroundings but she was sure that all hell had broken loose.

Torres had dog-piled onto Meredith, fists flying and Meredith's lackies went for her. A hand in her hair, and someone kicked her in the side. She couldn't curl up around herself with someone holding her hair like that, so she jerked in their grasp, gasping for air.

She was shoved down by another pair of hands, hitting her head on the floor this time, and she was finally able to draw enough breath to shout for help. But she barely got a sound out before her assailants kicked her in the side again.

She couldn't breathe. Her nose was bleeding as well and she was choking on spit and blood, coughing onto the tiles. She tried to fight, throwing an elbow back, trying to beat them off, punches and jabs barely connecting because they were used to this and she was absolutely whatsoever not.

She got one good lick in on a girl with meth teeth and managed to punch some of the crumbling ruins out. She scratched her with her nails, catching her on the lip and tearing a ragged line across them which started to bleed.

But then, it was two of them against one of her and she took a solid pow to the gut, and that was when a sharp burning pain pierced through her, and everything around her stopped and whirled for a while. She moaned, her breath coming in ragged and in huffs, almost hacking up her meagre food from earlier.

All that got was for her face to be smashed into the floor again. She tried to scream — whatever happened to those perverted guards with a view — but her cheek was pressed to the wet floor and she was half-drowning in water, half in her own blood and she couldn't breathe, she couldn't breathe.

A whistle blew and the water was shut off as female guards poured into the shower hall, separating everyone. The two meth girls on top of her were dragged off and she rolled onto her side before she could sit up, scrambling to put her back against the wall.

Addison tipped to the side and heaved up bile and blood and she was hustled into a corner by a female guard as the others tried to pull Torres off Meredith.

The shower was empty, she noticed — just the three of them and female officers.

Torres did a lot of damage from what she could see. Meredith was bleeding pretty badly too, swollen faced and had a shiner already forming.

"You don't touch her," Torres growled, "She don't wanna be with you. Get that through your thick skull."

"For now," Meredith spat bloodied phlegm onto Torres's feet before she allowed herself to be carted back into the corners.

"Alright, who the hell started this?!" the dark haired female guard shouted.

"She did," Meredith pointed to Addison.

"No, I didn't! She did!" Addison protested, cupping her nose where blood was still gashing out.

_What is this? Elementary school?_

The guard just rolled her eyes before going back out and she could hear hushed voices outside before she returned.

"Meredith, you're going in SHU."

"What the fuck?!" Meredith shrieked as she was being dragged away. She gave her a death glare before hissing, "Oh, I'm coming back for you. Make no mistake about that. You better look over your shoulder!"

She watched as she was being dragged away and the question of whether she ought to be terrified of said threat whirl around her head.

_Should she be scared?_

Meredith cut up her own girlfriend, so, yes, she should be. And her people almost drowned her today.

"Come here," the female guard said to her, "let me see."

Addison staggered on her feet, very aware that she was still bare. Her knees felt like water, her stomach like fiery knots.

The officer tipped her face up, smooths her thumbs gently over her nose and cheeks and she hissed and gasped, grounding at the radiating pain. Her fingers pushed through her hair, like a massage.

"Nothing broken," she said, pleased, hands skimming over her ribs, clinically. "Open your eyes and follow my finger please." She moved it across her vision and nodded, satisfied, when she could track it. "No concussion. You'll be bruised and swollen, but you'll live."

The officer draped a towel over her shoulders. "You want to go to the infirmary?" she asked.

Addison’s head and stomach was throbbing with pain and she just wanted to get back to her cell and sleep forever. "No." she said. “I’ll be fine.”

“Alright. Get dressed and get back to your cell, both of you.”

She finally got into first fight and who knew it'd happen in prison.

* * *

Some nights, she couldn't sleep. Other nights, very rarely, she slept like the dead. On this particular night though, she was poked roughly in the ribs, with what she would later guess was a baton, and then, a loud booming voice shouted into her ear, "Off your lazy ass!"

She startled awake so bad and so fast up on her bed that she almost fell overboard. A dull pain thumped about her abdomen from her fight with Meredith and her people and she groaned loudly climbing down from her bed.

It had been almost a week and a half since the incident in the showers and she’s still mostly bruised.

She was still groggy, dried tear tracks on her face and she felt as though she hadn't slept a wink. What she wouldn't give for another couple of hours.

"What?" she rubbed her eyes, utterly confused.

Once she managed to get out of bed and dressed, she waited in line in the hallway with the other girls and that was when she spied on a guard's watch; it was four in the morning. She didn't ask why she and Torres were being called, or where they would be taking them because she knew they'd scream right in her face once she opened her mouth.

"Work call!" she heard another guard shout from another cell.

 _Oh_.

Finally. She was a little excited to know what her job would be because all she'd been doing this past month was read and write in her journal about how much she fucking hated this place and how she was supposed to be in rotations right now, learning new kinds of techniques, and experiencing a different kind of exhaustion. Not the kind that resulted from being in prison all day.

Because there's just something about prison air that drains you.

Work would be good for her — _yeah_ , a way for her to keep busy.

They were led outside and it was the first time in more than two weeks since the outside had touched her skin and she got a little emotional because she never thought she'd ever miss fresh air and natural lighting and the beaming sun rays.

It was everything she took for granted. It was everything that happened naturally, a natural occurrence when one's not locked in.

The sun had just risen and the warmth felt gentle on her skin. She had gotten even paler since she got here.

The XXX Correctional Facility is a large large large _LARGE_ piece of land, they must have been walking for twenty minutes straight before they reached the ' _fields_ '. She wasn't sure what this job entailed but she was starting to not like where this was heading.

Officer Trent was already there and the moment she saw him, her mood soured. She couldn't stand the guy.

"Ladies," he smiled brightly, cockily, thinking he looked charming. _Ugh_ , she wanted to vomit. "Grab a tool and start working." he said, making a lewd gesture to which she averted her eyes.

She went to get a tool that looked familiar to her. It looked like something her mother had in the gardening shed but even bigger.

Everyone then broke off to go to a separate section of the perimeter whilst she just stood there not knowing what to do. Torres stuck by her, trying to silently, eyeing her to steer in a good direction before she drew too much attention to herself, but it was too late. Officer Asshole had caught her.

"Connecticut Princess, are we unclear about what we have to do?" Trent's eyebrow raised.

"No, _sir_. It's fine. I got it."

"I don't think you do," he got in between her and Torres, who gave Officer Trent a foul look behind his back, "It's your first day doing hard labour, so I'll show you what to do. Looks like you need a strong man in your life. That'll be all Torres." Officer Trent said, merely waved her off with a flick of his wrist.

Callie had no choice but to back away before Trent mowed over to her with his long strides, taking her by the arm and out of sight from the rest of the women. She knew what he was doing; he was isolating her for a reason and not a good one.

"Let's start here," he said, pointing to a patch of weeds that were growing over the path. "Just earth 'em up and put 'em in the bag. Not hard work. These are the good duties. There are much _much_ worse ones to be assigned to."

The threat in his voice was clear — keep him sweet or else.

"Why don't you pull one up?" his hand on her shoulder was heavy, as he pushed her down to her knees. "Bend over and put your back into it."

She didn't like not being able to see him. She felt like he was going to do something, and so she kept looking over her shoulder. She had no choice but to comply, to bend forward with the trowel and wedge up the weeds.

"Good girl," he praised her and she felt her space around getting darker and darker as he loomed, kneeling down behind her. "Keep going, alright?"

* * *

Prisons were made for men by men.

 _They_ had never had women in mind during the whole process. Probably because women aren’t perceived to be rule breakers like men are, since it’s not very lady-like to break the rules or even, be violent. Because violence and crime aren’t associated with femininity, womanhood. And if they did commit a crime, it’d be because there was something fundamentally wrong with them, with their brains, or that they were possessed by a demon.

From mental asylums to prisons resembling classrooms to more than fifty women crammed into a dingy attic above the kitchen where food was served just once a day in an all-male prison to the now, sex-specific prisons.

They have come a long way but it was not without reason.

Because back in the day, female inmates were actually considered more trouble than men even though their crimes were often nonviolent offences. One female prisoner was seen as more trouble than twenty males. This attitude was due to the belief that women needed _individualised attention_ since there had to be — there absolutely just had to be something distorted within her that she could committed X,Y,Z, as women were viewed as being more pure and moral by nature than men. And the woman who dared to stray or fell from elevated pedestal was regarded as having fallen a greater distance than a man, and hence as being beyond any possibility of reformation.

Like she said prisons were made by men. Still is. They never had women in mind and that fact hadn’t really blossomed as the centuries progressed. Not much has changed, though, other than there are female correctional facilities now.

Because women does have vastly different needs than men — both mentally and physically. Women require more emotional support and that's why they are more likely than men to form same-sex relationships in prison. And physically, women have breasts and men do not _(well, technically, they do);_ women menstruate while men — she hopes, they do not. And she finds that women's periods really does sync up. Though there are no scientific evidence to support the claim, that menstrual cycles of women who live together or who otherwise spend a lot that of time with each other sync up.

But it’s true. It’s fact.

If witnessing it first hand in prison isn't proof enough, she doesn't know what is.

Because Torres had just gotten her period this morning and now, she watched as her roommate and a handful of women walk up to a male guard one by one, she hadn’t seen him around before, he must be new, at the guard's station. She giggled to herself when he blanched, looked visibly uncomfortable before handing them two tampons each and waving at them to get out of his sight.

Once Torres got back into their cell, she went straight for the toilet. "Have you had yours yet?" she asked.

"What?"

"Your period. When you get it, you go up to the guards station and you tell them, hassle them until they give you — it says so in the handbook that they’d give us a box every month. But where is it?” Torres questioned, getting all riled up now, and Addison wasn’t sure if it was rhetorical or if she was actually asking her a genuine question. “It’s in commissary for forty dollars. I tell you, they rob you blind there." she explained.

Addison nodded slowly, chewing her bottom lip and let her thoughts wander ... calculating ... remembering.

 _How long had it been?_ Addison scrunched her brow, thinking. She'd always been a little irregular. Some months, a week late, others, a day or two and it wasn’t ever a cause for panic. She had never had her period on the expected date, even long before she started birth control. And they use protection all the time — most of all of the time.

But they did the last time. _Didn’t they?_

"You've been here for over a month already and you haven't had your period yet." was what Torres stated next, raising an eyebrow at her.

A shivery panic began to creep within her, heightening her nerves, and she ran her hands over her face with a rough exhale. But she continued to stay silent ... remembering ... calculating ... dreading ...

Her stomach had been cramping a bit lately. But she just chalked that down to her period was right around the corner.

Very possibly, it’d be coming soon.

_Right?_

"Do you think ..."

She snapped up immediately, scoffing. "No. No. Don't be silly, Callie," she said, pursing her lips, "I’m not. I was on the pill. It must just be the stress."

Prison is after all a very stressful environment. And she had recently been in a fight. And Meredith had threatened to harm her. _Possibly kill her?_ So, she'd been watching her back ever since. And Officer Trent had been harassing her and she doesn’t even know how to handle that; it was easier to just block it out.

She looked at Torres with her eyes shinning ominously and said, “I’m not pregnant.”

But she thought she might be over seven weeks late.

But she thought to herself that the universe couldn’t possibly hate her this much.

She couldn’t be pregnant.

"I think you are."

/

**_Hey, guys! Thanks so much for reading. Hope you enjoyed._ **

**_So, Addison is pregnant. It’s gonna be tough for her. What do you think she should do? What do you think is going to happen? Let me know what you guys think_ ** **.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Out of Sight, Out of Mind**

_**Chapter Five** _

_"I need you to do me a favour. I'll do whatever you want in return"_

* * *

> _**June 28th,** _

Often times, Addison finds herself awake at night, in the early hours of the morning when she’s alone with her thoughts and alone in the small room that’s assigned to her.

More like a room where she has been forcibly kept in but whatever.

Before this — before all of this whatnot _(prison)_ — she had no trouble sleeping. Just the usual all-nighters and the occasional partaking in college parties, but other than that she slept soundly.

It’s times like these that she is forced to realise that all those years she’d been wrong. Or, at least, partially wrong. Because happiness is fleeting. Life is fleeting and it's fleeting right before her while she's stuck in here, having to witness and listen to stupid fights after fights because someone's looking at someone's girlfriend the wrong way.

Just the other day when she was still in gen pop, a girl had thrown another girl off the third tier because she was talking to her girlfriend, which is a no-no in prison, she'd come to learn. Luckily, there was a safety net to catch her for that very purpose.

And that right there is the every day life for an inmate.

That's her kind of life right now because she's an inmate while they get to live, their time has not stopped, not like their's has. And that's probably the saddest truth to realise. Because Savvy and Weiss are engaged _(as told by a letter from her best friend)_ and while they have all started rotations, she's never going to have that.

She can't be a doctor with a felony in her record. And with drug charges nonetheless.

She'd always thought nothing could be ripped away from her — not her freedom, privacy and definitely not her privileged life. She just hadn’t ever realised the possibility of losing it all in an instant until someone took it away from her.

And now — she’s irrevocably and completely screwed because she's pregnant. She can't believe she's in this predicament as being in prison sans pregnancy is hard enough already.

She doesn't want this baby. Not now at least. Not at twenty-three and definitely not while in prison. But when the time comes, and it will come, her only hope is for them to be _'kind'_ enough to take her to a hospital. She doesn't know how it's all going to go down. She still hasn't seen a doctor and the nurse who told her the news was less than helpful.

It'd been two weeks ago, now, since she went to the nurse.

Maybe that is what actually keeps her up at night, the horrible realisation that she is at the complete will and mercy of another person, and there’s absolutely not a thing she could do about it.

* * *

> _**April 15th,** _

Addison was tired. Of course, she had just gotten back from manual labour _(she'd lived a pretty pampered and comfortable life so far)_ under the scorching sun; she's exhausted, she ached and there were sharp pains pulsating deep in her bones as she dragged herself to the shower hallbfor a cold, refreshing shower.

She might be coming down with something, she told herself, sniffing.

She felt somewhat foolish for this, for whining, and rather selfish because it could be much worse. Much much worse. She could be assigned to janitorial duties and she'd rather die than touch a toilet. But than again, raking and digging ... under the burning sun ... her present state was justified, she supposed, and would explain why she was feeling so feverish.

Callie seemed fine, though — and the other girls around her, too. Granted, Callie had been in hell and hell again and all the way through for a lot longer than she had. But the good thing about having a friend who'd been here for eight long years was that she knew the prison like the back of her hand, knew where to stand in the field so the guards wouldn't see them standing around, slacking off, and knew of a spot where there'd be less sun exposure.

Still, even with Callie's expertise, she got herself toasted.

Looking around, she wondered where Callie had ran off. She hated the showers, only because it was so uncomfortable - the guards were always too gawky. And though she understood that this was the hotspot for 'transactions' and for fights to go down but couldn't they have female officers standing guard?

Once she was done with her shower, she turned the faucet off and caught the sight of two guards by the entrance staring right at her. She quickly looked away and carefully towelled herself off and into undergarments and pants before it was with horror that she stared at herself in the mirror _(it's not even a mirror; it's more like a reflective pan so thick that you can hardly even see yourself)_ she saw a vast expense of red covering her skin.

Sunburns hurt. A lot. Being obscenely pale meant she burned easily. Though she wasn't really used to getting sunburns, these were the worst she had ever had.

_And what's wrong with the New York summer? Aren't they closer to Canada from here?_

Her face, neck and forearms were blistering red. Truly, it didn't look this bad when she was out. She would've pinched the bridge of her nose if that wouldn't have proved to be too painful.

"You know, there's such a thing as sunblock," a girl she'd seen a couple of times said, "That's my sink, Freddy Krueger."

After talking to Trent about the shipment coming in Friday, Callie finds Addison in the showers, arguing with a girl about a sink.

The impulse to reach out and slowly drag her fingers down the curve of her friend's pinkened shoulder caught Callie off guard. It was even more unsettling when she traced the many moles on her friend's back with her eyes and wanted to rub it with her thumb or lick it, which was kind of worse.

It continued from there. Montgomery was standing in the middle of the showers without a shirt, just a towel covering her modesty, with most of her skin a bright and alarming pink, giving way quite suddenly to her pale skin of her back, while arguing with a girl about a sink.

"Keep telling me what to do and I'll stab your face off."

Just an everyday conversation in prison.

Callie was close to Addison now. Perhaps closer than strictly necessary, but from this distance she could feel heat radiating from her friend's skin. There was something sharp rather than stifling about it, as if it was being directed specifically to her hand and hers alone, which was entirely illogical. So much so that Callie decided to raise a hand, reach out, and fold it over one UV-warmed shoulder.

“Ow ow ow!”

The shoulder was jerked from her grasp and Addison was turning around to face her.

“Torres, what the hell?”

Callie, however, found herself preoccupied by the lighter impressions of her fingers fading back to pink.

 _Fascinating_.

The other girl just laughed as though she found Addison's pain hilarious.

"Beat it, Santiago. All you do is cause trouble."

"What you goin' do about it?"

"Wanna have your teeth knocked out? Who'd you think they'll lock up in SHU?" Callie countered, folding her arms around her chest. "Try me."

There was a moment of silence before Santiago cursed at both of them and left.

"Thanks. But how come when I say things like that they don't take me seriously?"

"Because." Callie shrugged, "You're soft."

"Are you calling me fat?"

"Fat?" Callie scoffed, "You're not fat, you skinny white bitch." she huffed a laugh out then, and she could see Addison's eyes widen so much as she punched her on the arm playfully.

"That looks painful."

"That's because it is," she whines, "Is there sunscreen in commissary?" Addison asks.

"Nope. I've had the sheet memorise front and back." Callie said, pointedly, "Come," cocking her head towards the direction of they're shared cell, "I think I might have something that could help you with that." she said and Addison followed behind.

Once they made it to their cell, Callie give her permission to sit on her bed. And as she went to sit on the bottom bunk, she spouted ows with every movement she made, one that ended with a prolonged groan of pain as she fell heavily onto the mattress, grooves digging into her tender, over-cooked flesh.

“Oh, God, it fucking hurts. It’s like the sun is trying to burst out through my skin,” Addison whimpered as she spread out her arms. It stung like hell when they stick to her sides. "I don't think the shower helped at all."

"You're too pale, that's why."

"It's not my fault I'm Irish. Instead of tanning I just catch on fire."

Callie chuckled, looking at her friend. She clasped her hands behind her back, observing the reddening of Addison's face. It not only stretched over her cheeks, but her forehead and chin as well. And her nose. Against the pinkened skin was a more apparent set of freckles that were scattered across the bridge of her nose and spread outward to her cheeks. Another illogical impulse overcame her. It was a strong desire to run her finger along those heated specks, to discover new constellations within them and give them names.

“Torres, hey," Addison snapped her fingers in front of her, "You alright? You’re looking a little flushed.”

Callie heard her voice cut into her reverie, heart hammering in her chest, face reddening and it wasn't because of the humidity in here.

 _Nope_.

“No. Yeah. Fine." she turned about, needing to put distance between her fragile control and her cellmate's skin, “Want a drink?” Callie asked as she reached into her container, which can be bought in commissary, that was under the bunk bed.

“Uh, yeah, sure. Thanks.” Addison pouted then, nodding; she sure could use a drink but something is off because Callie doesn't ever share her sodas. Never ever. So the offer was so unusual and so very un-Callie. Addison didn't know how Callie got a case of it every month, but she did, like clockwork and she didn't ever ask.

There’s an unmistakable smile on Callie's face as she tossed one to her, who hissed as cold droplets of condensation fall onto her sunburnt skin.

“Was that you, or the sizzle of your skin?” Callie asked as she popped the can open.

“Ha. Ha. Very funny,” Addison mocked, trying to hide her grimace when more liquid fell onto her as she opened her own can.

When she looked back up at Callie she’s no longer grinning, eyebrows drawn in worry.

“It really hurts that much?”

“Yessss,” she hissed between her teeth, now unsure where to set her beverage down.

Callie laid a tentative hand on her arm again, which get pulled away with a grunt of pain. “Ow, I told you, sun, radiating out of my skin.”

“Well, where doesn’t it hurt?”

They both scan over her reddened frame. For only this moment, Addison was grateful for the sunburn, her blush hidden by her heated skin.

"Everywhere."

Callie rolled her eyes and went to snatch a bottle of Sauve that was sitting on the little side table. "Here. I'll help you," she bit out.

"Oh. Um. You don't have to ..." Addison tried to protest, said that she could do it herself but Callie wasn't having any.

"Turn around or I'll turn you around myself." Callie said in a threatening tone, hands inches from her redden arm. "And I won't be gentle."

"Okay. Okay. Turning around," Addison said and started to gingerly lift herself up so she could manoeuvre and fit into the small bottom bunk, "Thank you, Callie."

And she meant it sincerely. Almost two months of their kind-of-sort-of friendship she knew she wouldn't have survived prison this long without Callie. It was funny how fast they clicked.

Callie stepped forward, knowing that the burned skin stretching and wrinkling with Addison's movements must hurt like a bitch. She sat the bottle on the ground before helping Addison out of her shirt, making sure the fabric didn't drag against her aggravated skin. She had to cringe in sympathy when the true redness of Addison's upper body was revealed. She looked like someone had slow roasted her on a spit.

"Jesus, Connecticut," she said as he stepped to the side and pointed to the bed. "Sit."

She quickly sat down with her back facing Callie, and Callie settled behind her.

She had seen some pretty astounding things throughout her lifetime, but she'd never once witnessed someone burn so quickly, and so easily, like Addison Montgomery did. And it wasn't like they're down in Texas or Florida, even. But this summer did seem to be uncharacteristically hot.

Even so, her fair-skinned cellie was taking it in the best way she could, Callie noted, as she uncapped the lotion again and squirted a generous amount onto her hands.

Slowly, carefully, the coated fingers reached down and touched the crimson canvas of bare skin.

Addison remained impressively still.g

"Does that hurt?" Callie asked, pausing in her task.

"No," Addison replied, shaking her head, though it was unclear if she was telling the truth.

Callie nodded and then resumed her application of the lotion. The gelatinous green goop glimmered on Addison's arms and back and made her think of snot for some reason, but she carried on in spite of the unpleasant association her brain had conjured.

"You think if I asked the guards nicely -"

Callie cut her off as she squirted some more lotion onto her fingers and spread it across her hands. "To bring in contraband? Wanna have your release date extended?" Addison shivered within as Callie spread the cool gel along her shoulder.

"Besides do you even know what you'll have to do in exchange?"

"A blowjob?"

Callie scoffed, "Worse."

_You'll be indebted to them for the rest of your sentence._

There was a fair bit of silence between them before either of them spoke again.

"I'm not a beach kinda person," Callie grumbled at her, paying more attention to the fact that the sun abuse had brought out a blanket of dark freckles along Addison's shoulders. It would probably have been more attractive and cute if she weren't violently red as well, but it was ... interesting to look at. "Not anymore, at least."

"You're not an anything person," Addison shot back lightly, and Callie could hear the smile in her voice. "No, wait, you're a sit alone and mope person. Or a stand a distance away and stare menacingly person."

Callie rolled her eyes before she got more lotion and continued covering Addison's back. "I don't like the heat," she clarified, running her fingers lightly across the back of Addison's neck. Every time the pads of her fingers moved over a mole, she wanted to rub it with her thumb, which was kind of a startling thought.

"Do you like the cold, then?" Addison asked, letting her head fall forward to rest her chin on her chest. Her voice was thick, possibly sleepy, or more like she was enjoying this quite a bit.

"That's worse," she answered, her eyes following the line of Addison's spine down.

"I like snow."

"You wait till winter. See if you still like it when you're shovelling snow up to your waist." Callie said with a little glint in her voice as she dragged her fingers down her back.

Addison groaned.

Callie laughed, only realising then that her fingers were just barely touching the hem of Addison's pants. She swallowed and drew her hands away. "There," she said, clearing her throat. "Better?"

"Yeah," Addison said, straightening and looking over her shoulder. "Thanks."

The lights were only slightly dimmed for the night - just barely - and Addison felt oddly at ease, comfortable, even, calm. But the feeling evaporated when the bell buzzed out loudly, followed by the harsh clinging of opening block gates.

A guard yelled out then, "Count in ten, maggots!" And Addison was pulled back into a state of alertness, to where she really was.

"Montgomery, Torres," Officer Wilson called out with a warning tone in his voice as he patrolled around the cells, "Next time's a shot." he said, indicating that they have broken the rules.

They weren't supposed to be on the bed together, was what the rule was. Only one person at one time. They couldn't sit together. Even if they were there just to play cards, braid each other's hair; they were not even supposed to touch each other. Even if somebody had a broken bone.

_Because God forbid you help them._

Some of the guards were real stickler for rules and would have given them both a shot right than and there and some wouldn't give them a hard time for something so small and mundane.

She nodded at Officer Wilson before moving to sit down on the floor.

"Sit up a little so I can rub some on your face, too." Callie said, once the officer was out of sight.

"But - but," Addison stuttered, "That's Sauve. I can't put that on my face."

"Why not?"

"Because I'll break out."

Callie considered for virtually zero seconds. "Right. Forgot that you were Connecticut's princess." she said, smiling to herself.

"You're mean." Addison told her.

"I may be mean but do you really want wrinkles?"

Addison kind of wanted to say 'yes' just so she could feel an ounce of victory. But she didn't want wrinkled.

Callie looked down to find her cellie squinting up at her, though it wasn't by choice. Addison's cheeks were burnt and rubbery, and if her prominent nose were any redder she would have mistaken it for the inside of a Jammie Dodger.

It was all … pretty endearing, actually _(not that she'd risk upsetting Addison by speaking that particular thought)._

"Try and hold still," Callie instructed, bringing two fingers out.

Addison closed her eyes and kept herself from flinching as the lotion was applied to her poor cheeks and nose; it felt heavenly, but the impulse to move away was strong, just because her burns weren't taking too kindly to being touched.

"Wilson's not an asshole. Not like Trent." Addison said to fill in the silence.

Not all correctional officer were horrible and corrupt like Officer Trent. Some did what they were supposed to do, not assault or put them down like some did.

"Right," Callie mused and then, smirked, "He's one of the good ones. He and your _boyfriend_ , too. It doesn’t hurt that they’re both cute." she broke into a smile and ducked away slightly, lifting her hands up in mock surrender.

Addison smacked her on the shin, irregardless.

"Karev is not my boyfriend."

"Coulda fooled me. You know those cartoons where there's a bear or whatever and it's starving and and it looks at a table and the table turns into this delicious cooked turkey with like lines of deliciousness off it? Why don't you just go there already?" she said, laughing brightly as she pulled the same face she’d been making previously.

In response, Addison shuffled closer, sitting so that she was face-to-face with Callie at the edge of her bed again, forgetting all about the rules.

Callie just looked at her while she complained. The freckles across her cheeks and nose were more obvious, and she found herself wanting to greet them with kisses.

"Oh my God," Addison exclaimed before lowering to a whisper, remembering that she's in prison and that gossip spreads like wildfire, "I was not looking at Officer Karev like that; I have a boyfriend."

"You know us girls have needs too, right?" Callie asked suggestively, raising an eyebrow at her.

"Y-yeah." Addison whispered hesitantly, uncharacteristically blushing.

"You know, Nora. Jesus is her lord and saviour." Callie said in explanation.

She nodded.

_Tier three. Vehicular manslaughter. She ran the church here._

"She's a wife in here, too. We call it 'gay-for-the-stay'."

"Are you suggesting _we_ get together?"

Callie gave her a quizzical look.

"You do know there are girls who thinks we're together, right? I guess we're too close for their liking. I've had girls staring at me like I stole you or something."

"What? What are you talking about, Connecticut?" Callie laughed lightly and pursed her lips, her cheeks immediately flamed up as she shook her head, "Steal me? Me? Puh-lease." she scoffed, laughing nervously as she rubbed the back of her neck, "You? You did not steal me. You - you -"

"Calm down, Torres. I was just kidding," Addison said with an all too innocent smile on her face and Callie kind of wants to ruin it with a kiss. "No, but really, whom did I stole you from? Is she here?"

* * *

> **_April 20th,_ **

Next week faired much better for her skin. Thanks to Callie, who had, one day dropped a bottle of sunblock on her lap as she was getting ready for the day.

"What's this?" Addison had asked, examining the bottle for what it was since it looked as though the label was torn off.

"Sunblock. For you. So, you don't have to look like a lobster anymore."

"Oh, Torres," she had said, cracking a little smile but almost immediately giving her a sympathetic pout, "what did you have to do?"

Callie shrugged, taking a drag of her cigarette. "Don't sweat it."

She thanked her immensely the following days, but there was still that thought - what did she do in exchange - but she knew she had to have made a deal with the devil himself, Officer Trent.

* * *

> **_April 26th,_ **

Addison collapsed to the ground the second the officer called a five minute break and Callie took a seat beside her prone body.

"I'm dying," Addison said.

"You say that everytime you sweat." Callie rolled her eyes.

"That's because I die everytime I sweat, Torres. But this time I mean it." she groaned, lifting herself up so that she was sitting directly in front of Callie. "My stomach's been crazy lately. I think it's the slop we've been eating."

She'd been suffering with bouts of nausea and stomach cramps all week.

The wind blew harder at them. And Callie, sitting between Addison and the dug-up ground, looked like something out of a music video. Her hair flew into the air, blowing away from her face, displaying every curve and dip of her face perfectly. Callie noted with mild interest that Addison's red hair made her blue eyes look brighter by comparison, giving them a sharp edge.

Addison's lips took on an interested tilt, defining her cheeks lightly. "What are you staring at?"

"Nothing," Callie answered quickly.

There was a smear of soil on Addison's cheek.

"You're a mess," she observed, reaching a hand forward to thumb off the dirt. When she pulled her thumb back, Callie realised she had leaned in much closer than she anticipated.

Instead of the beating of her heart nearly bumping her ears off her head, Torres got the wind intensified by one thousand.

"You know what?" Addison asked.

"What?"

Callies's voice was small. She was surprised Addison could even hear her at all.

Addison did hear her. Either that, or she read her lips. Because she took in one deep breath and said what Callie didn’t know she was waiting for. "I really love you, Torres."

Addison had been in a chatty mood, lately. Callie found herself nodding along as she light a cigarette, trying not to read too much into that.

_As a friend. She loves you as a friend._

"This marks two months. And I'm still alive because of you."

"Like I said I wish I had me as a newbie."

She returned her smile wholeheartedly, her blood singing, and then Addison caught a whiff of cigarette-smoke, dense and pungent, and her stomach lurched wildly, bringing her to her side as she abrupt to a halt.

Callie moved to her side, her brow furrowed, and Addison immediately pressed a hand against her mouth, trying not to hurl her guts up. Still, Callie kept her concerned gaze, questions coming her way, and Addison shook your head, waving her free hand at her, as though trying to usher Callie away, or dispel the smoke which surrounded her, thick and fog-like.

“You okay, Connecticut?”

Eventually, she managed to quell the sickness, holding her hands against her heaving ribcage. She swallowed, taking little sips of air in through her nose, “I’m fine. I’m okay. Just, please, don’t smoke around me. I can’t stand the smell of it.”

Her words were clipped, her tone short, because she was horribly aware that the queasy feeling could return at any moment, and she didn't want to be caught with her mouth open, just in case.

"I'm sorry. You were fine with it before."

She closed her eyes, trying to regain her composure, “I was. It's fine. I've just been feeling unwell..”

She figured the lack of sufficient nutrients was why she've been so tired lately.

"You should really put in a sick call, then." Callie said, "You probably could get in some time next week."

* * *

> _**May 8th,** _

Callie wasn't blind.

Callie knew something was wrong from the very start. She hadn’t expected this, though. She had woken up before Addison for the first time in over two months. On top of that, Addison had spent the whole night vomiting at random times of the night, and when she was finished, she was pale and obviously exhausted, still complaining of being nauseated. She wondered if Addison had eaten something bad the night before but no one else was sick here. They had all ate the same food.

"Oi, Connecticut, get up," Callie said, hanging her wet towel over the railing of the bunk bed.

"Connecticut?"

A voice breaks into her confusion. It’s soft - feminine - familiar.

"Lord! You sleep like the dead. C'mon, get up Connecticut."

There was a hand on her shoulder next and it was enough to snap her into consciousness as she blinked blearily up at Callie.

“Callie?”

But Callie gave her an unimpressed look and crossed her arms. “Yeah. It's me. You got any idea what time it is?”

She blinked again and tried to remember the last time she’d looked at her watch - _oh, wait, she's in prison._

“I don't know.”

“Try eight.”

“Nooo. It's Friday. You have got to be kidding me.” she groaned and dropped her head into her hands. “I missed the coffee cake again?”

"You missed the coffee cake again." she nodded.

All of a sudden, Addison had her hand over her nose and mouth. She'd gone pale. And in the next second, she was snapping up and bolting from the top bunk to the toilet.

When Callie followed her, she was on her knees in front of the toilet, vomiting what little was left in her stomach from her last bout of nausea. She was hunched over holding her stomach and Callie knelt down beside her cellmate rubbing her back.

“Montgomery, are you okay?”

She could have slapped herself because - _no, of course she wasn’t okay if she was currently vomiting into the toilet and groaning._

Addison shook her head. “My stomach hurts,” she grunted out between gritted teeth, “and I'm still feeling insanely nauseated.” She let out a high whine as she groaned and slumped farther down on the ground.

Callie didn't know what to say to that. "I tried waking you up," she settled her a fact instead.

"I am just, really fucking tired.”

Callie had noticed that Addison's patterns have changed since she first came in.

As they've got nothing else better to do in prison than watch each other, Callie had noticed that Addison's patterns had changed since she first came in.

She knew it was only a matter of time before Carol would get wind of whom with her girlfriend was cheating on her. She knew Darleen was making bets with Janice when she shouldn't be. She knew the Skinheads had tried to recruit Addison into their gang. She knew that almost everyday at around five Officer Mills would call Rosa down and they'd disappear and wouldn't reappear again for another half an hour. She knew dumb Stevenson would be going into county jail and she knew she and her girlfriend were planning on smuggling contraband back into the prison when she comes back.

It was a flawed plan since guards would listen in on all their phone calls.

So lesson one, don't make plans by phone.

Callie knew everything that went down in this hellhole because she would watch quietly. So, she knew it when her cellmate was acting weird.

But it was also nothing too concerning, not anything trivial or worth raising brows since it is apart of human nature to evolve. To get used to one's surroundings. But Addison had always been a very light sleeper, she said so herself, but the nausea she had been having, now that was more alarming

Addison groaned again. "I think I'm dying."

Callie snorted. "No, you're not. It's just a stomach bug or something."

"Like I said, dying." her voice was muffled by her hands.

She gave her quick, worried glances, but, for the most part kept her eyes on what she was doing. "I told Karev you were sick, he said to let you sleep."

Addison looked at her deadpan at what she was suggesting.

"I was just kidding. Sheesh." she chuckled, "It's almost count and you're still not out of your sleep clothes."

Addison growled and she lifted her head. "Fine."

"Stop acting like a kid and get up."

* * *

> _**May 24th** _

By Sunday, after spending two hours in visitations with her parents and Archer _(she'd never spent this much time with her parents, ever)_ and listening to Bizzy go on about how skin cancer runs in the family, and despite all her expectations that this _'flu-like'_ symptoms might clear up on its own, Addison found herself laying back on her bed, with a makeshift heating pad over her abdomen and her knees curled up because feeling smaller made her feel slightly better.

It's mildly disconcerting, she guessed.

Addison was still tired, and worse still, she was saddled with nausea and aching muscles and a sudden craving for peppermint mochas and triple-chocolate cheesecake _(among all kinds of other things she didn't usually allow herself)_ — and, as Callie reminded her, telling her that there were leftovers from the birthday celebration she wasn't invited to.

It stung a little. Callie's friends didn't seem to like her. But it was alright since nobody ever liked her before they got to know her. She had to learn the hard way that not everybody had to like her.

"You said you made cheesecake. Do you still have some?" Addison asked. She was fucking hungry. Had been for days. All she had been feeling in prison was extreme hunger.

"Cheesecake are a freaking devil food, y'know," Callie went on, though she kept dishing some up out of the container, "And not that it isn't tasty, because, not to toot my own horn, I make some damn fine cheesecake for what it is. Just, what it is? Is still a cheesecake."

Addison didn't understand her in the slight. She didn't know what Callie was getting on to.

"What it is," Addison drawled and shook her head ever so slightly, "is taking too long to get over here so I can eat it."

"Well, excuse me, Princess! I beg Your Highness' pardon for keeping you waiting."

Addison flinched and tried to shrink into the mattress. Had to stop herself from outright burrowing into the cushions and trying to hide in them like a grave because Callie didn't mean it like that.

Addison heaved a sigh of relief when Callie went on, "I just mean, cheesecake's a dishonest food. It's like a liar, and lying just breeds dishonesty. It's not like pie. Pie's honest with you. The crust doesn't go around hiding the flavor, like cheesecake. Cheesecake's indecisive, too. It can't decide if it's sweet or sour, and it tries to hide one in the other, and —"

"And if you really love me, you'd just bring it to me and stop having a sermon like this," Addison said through a heavy sigh, "I am exhausted, I'm having cramps and some of the worst cravings I've had in my life, and considering how late it is? This period is probably going to put me through the wringer more so than usual, and I would appreciate you cooperating and giving me the cheesecake already. Please, Torres?"

Addison looked up from the pillows and saw that Callie was already there, smiling down at her and holding a plate. On it, she found two slices of cheesecake. She didn't even struggle to get them both down.

Which strikes her as rather odd, but on the other hand, she'd barely eaten anything today.

It was nowhere near the cheesecake from Patisserie Bonté but it's surprisingly good considering it's made out of coffee creamer and sprite and a little bit of cream cheese.

* * *

> **_May 25th,_ **

After two weeks of barely eating, the head pounding pain had started and two weeks after that she couldn’t have eaten even if she had wanted to.

So, when she started to feel a little more nauseated than usual and a little too often now, she brushed it off as the flu that's been going around and cursed her luck for catching it.

She continued on with her day like normal, waking up, raking the fields, digging holes, standing for count, lining up, and despite the repeated trips to the bathroom, she didn’t think much of it and chucked off the exhaustion that came with it as a side effect.

That same part also saw no problem with her spending most of her mornings in bed and completely missing out breakfast, staring at the walls or curled up under her blanket, whenever she got the chance.

Besides, she was always tired these days, so sleeping was only natural and not at all a misguided coping mechanism to deal with her reality, that she can't pray herself out.

* * *

> **_May 30th,_ **

She saw Derek on a Saturday. Over two months since settling in here. It was awkward and he had commented on her bruised cheek and split lip from her attack from Meredith and her lackies in the showers.

She shrugged him off, didn't want to worry him.

An hour later and he was gone. She went back to her cell crying and called him that night to tell him not come every weekend since it was hard - having to see him and then, not. She missed him.

He wouldn’t listen.

"It's hard, Addison. I know, but it's all worth it just to see you. I love you."

"I love you, too."

She still slept a lot but she actually welcomed it, since any moment not spent awake was one less moment of feeling the pain of her loss.

Lovesickness apparently translated to actual sickness and Addison had found the nausea, which was sometimes accompanied by vomiting and/or painful dry heaving, almost tragically poetic.

* * *

_"What is this look on your face?" she laughed._

_"I just saw the most beautiful woman I've ever clapped eyes on smiling. I think I'm justified in a little adoring smile,” Derek had explained._

_"Adoring smile? You look like you're obsessed with me!"_

_He pulled her into him and pressed his lips against hers. "With a girl like you, would that be so wrong?" he smiled._

_Dork._

They were so happy.

In the picture she brought with her, there was only Addison and Derek. It was them against the world. Little did they know, in a few short months, it would prove true; it was them against the world.

The world won.


	6. Chapter 6

**Out of Sight, Out of Mind**

* * *

_**Chapter Six** _

_"Ignoring the signs will not make it go away"_

* * *

> _**June 2nd,** _

For all the build up, Addison's period was thoroughly underwhelming when it came. A few days of spotting that barely even required pads, _and then?_ Nothing. Poof, just … back to normal.

Except for the parts where it kind of wasn't. Like for all of the new things that crop up while she just wanted to do her job — and it shouldn't have to be that much to ask. It shouldn't be this difficult, she'd gotten used to shovelling dirt but now, she felt winded instantly, like someone's tied a rubber band around her lungs, as soon as she started.

Just the walk alone took the breath right out of her.

But once they get back from field duty, it was like she was hardly even in her cell. Well, she was there, but she barely got to sit down before she had to get back up, rushing to the toilet and kneeling on the harsh, cold concrete _(never touching the stainless toilet because she'd rather die)_ as she prayed and waited for her stomach to just stop trying so hard to kill her — and it didn't stop there.

Too many days ended up with her rushing to her cell and to the toilet. One time, she couldn't even make it there. She barely made it to the waste bin at the back of the prison, and it was a small mercy that she managed to hold back on throwing up until her day had ended.

And if she wasn't here hurling, she was peeing, so trying to drink water while trying to avoid dehydration just kept this whole stupid process going and made her want to claw her fucking eyes out.

It just got worse when Meredith, being Meredith, had to go and notice. Addison knew she was watching her, could see her talking to her lackeys and pointing at her from her peripheral vision — and there was this one lunch time where she had basically missed, only eating part of it, before needing to rush off and vomit — she was eyeing her. Watching everything she did. Arching her eyebrow at her any time she saw her looking uncomfortable or shifting around in her seat, trying not to gag from the prison smells alone.

It would not surprise her if Meredith had started keeping track of every time she ran off.

It did surprise her when the Thursday after work, Meredith rolled into her cell, as though she belonged there and said, "Your girlfriend poisoning you, darling? Or is she just giving you food that is making you ill?"

Addison sighed and didn't dignify that passive-aggression by looking up from the book she was reading. She knew what she wanted to say there.

But the much more reasonable explanation was that she was simply ill or coming down with something, still. She might not be running a fever, but if this continued on next week, she probably ought to see the nurse.

So, as far as answering Meredith Grey went, she gave her the softest, most bemused smile that she could manage, and tried to imitate Meredith's characteristic drawl as she replied, "The only poison here is you. I'm probably just catching that bug that was going around — you know, the one that _you_ passed on."

Meredith snorted at that and since she was not one to run from any match of verbal sparring, but before she could do so, CO Karev came up, pulled Meredith by the elbow, and away from her cell.

"Ouch! Gosh! Was the really necessary?"

"That's a shot, Grey," Karev snapped, face void of emotion.

"Why? I didn't do anything wrong."

"Next time, maybe stick to your own cell."

Addison watched the whole ordeal as Karev and Meredith stared at each, no one blinking. Meredith craned her head towards her then, still having not blinked and she knew what was running through her head.

The voice of the guard snapped them both out of it.

"What do you think you're fucking looking at? Go!" Karev shouted, clearly having lost his patience.

Meredith snorted as she stride off while Addison's smile got more earnest.

She had never been happier to witness such a scene.

Karev casually stayed behind in her now-opened cell _(it would be buzzed shut at nine, where they'll be caged in for eleven hours)_ and she acknowledged him with a quick nod. "So, I see that you're back." she rasped.

She hadn't seen him in over a week and had overheard the guards saying that he was taking his annual leave.

"Yeah."

"What'd you do all week? What's new out there?" Addison asked, curious about the outside world, if anything had changed in the time she was forced out.

Karev bit his lip as he tried to hold back his smile. "Why're you suddenly curious?" he answered with another question, "Missed me?" he teased, eyebrow twitching before he muttered.

"Umm ... I mean ... I-I don't —" she fumbled with her words as she cracked her fingers, nervous and so fucking embarrassed.

"I did." His voice sounded genuine.

Addison pretended she didn't just hear that, didn't want to, at least. In hindsight, she probably shouldn't have led him on like this, though she was just playing around a bit. The flirting perhaps wasn't a good idea, but it was all in good fun.

It didn't seem fun anymore.

Nothing did.

She didn't know what else to say since an awkward silence passed over between them. There wasn't really anything more to say, really. Karev took a step back and turned to leave again.

"I'll see ya around." he smiled, wide and usual before turning on his heel to start patrolling again.

* * *

> _**June 3rd,** _

Furrowing her brow, Callie asked why was she having a tiff with Meredith again. Addison told her everything, from her noticing Meredith eyeing her to Karev telling her off. And she nearly choked on another sporkful of her mash when Callie's response was, "You and Derek used protection, right?"

Just like that. Out of nowhere.

Once she'd settled down again, even though she couldn't get her cheeks to stop feeling so hot and sick and pink, Addison supposed that this wasn't exactly any of Callie's business.

Which sounded a lot better than, _no, we don't, why would we bother? I'm on the pill, both of us are clean and we don't sleep with anybody else, unless you know something about my boyfriend's sexual proclivities that I don't._

"Well … if you did not," Callie sighed after Addison hadn't answered in a while, "Connecticut … have you considered that — Addison, could you be pregnant?"

It might make sense, but … _no_.

Addison shook her head. Perhaps a bit too strenuously, since it sent a pang right up to her forehead. But … no. She could not. She'd always been irregular. It was probably too late or too early for her to be PMSing, but … "I'm not pregnant, Torres," she said. "There's absolutely no way."

Frankly, she would love to just ignore things. It was easy to do so.

Once, she ignored a chest cold long enough that it developed into pneumonia. However, that issue was a lot more smoother to bury than this one. She didn't know what kind of flu would last almost three weeks long.

If only all of this issue could get so effectively buried in chocolate cake.

 _Ugh_. She was craving moist delicious chocolate cake right now.

She was still nauseated, though the puking problem was slowly starting to get better — or maybe she was just getting used to it — but despite the constant threat of vomiting, she was starving. Weak, she couldn't help but think, at least her cravings refused to conform to any patterns. Sometimes, they were just for tomatoes; other times, she wanted all of the chocolate chip cookies in a ten-mile radius.

But there was nothing she could do to curb those cravings, anyway.

She sighed then, deciding that denial was the best course of action and blamed it on the stress of being in prison and the inmates and the constant threat of danger. She had been trying her best to avoid Meredith as much as possible, which really wasn’t as easy as it seemed when you're locked in a box.

But surely that was what it had to be, a cold, because the only other alternative was highly _highly_ unlikely.

_Possible?_

Yes, but the cold theory was better suited, _right?_

* * *

> _**June 4th,** _

At yard time, Addison decided to go for a run around the track.

She felt too big for her own skin, her stomach felt as if everything inside was shifting and when she curled up in a ball on her bed, hands pressed against her aching belly, she longed for Derek's touch, even though she knew it would just make the whole situation worse.

Yes, she was being dramatic, but a large part of her felt that she was allowed to since seeing Derek and having to let him go again felt so much like the first time she did, almost three months ago.

She began feeling nauseous again the minute she started running and after not even a round of her jog, she had to stop to throw up all over the dry and dusty track, bile splattering up onto her skin as she pulled herself along. The dizzy spell that had hit her immediately after she had convinced herself to walk instead of run had also slowed her down.

She couldn't do anything right.

The other source of her misery was, of course, the first thing she noticed as she entered the chow hall for dinner and the nausea, which had cleared up once she had actually stopped running, returned full force when Meredith looked at her coldly.

Her hold around her chest tightened and she flinched, relaxing her arms to tug the shirt material away from her skin.

These prison laundry detergent must be too harsh because her clothes, that said _**711549**_ , felt much too rough on her skin these days, especially in her chest area.

Addison put down her spoon, suddenly losing her appetite. Or maybe she never had one and she started to feel a sinking feeling, as though walking in here was a graze mistake.

At two tables over, she heard voices being raised. A fight. Familiar voices but she didn't know them by names. She kept her eyes focused on the slop in front of her; she wasn’t about to get into another fight.

Only a moment later, she heard the _shmack_ of skin on skin contact, and someone hit the edge of the table. Addison glanced up and saw a woman wiping her nose as she bounced back up towards her assailant.

Addison heard the guards shouting, threatening them to stop fighting. One of the women picked up a food tray.

“Ladies, ladies, let’s settle down,” a third woman butted in, getting in between them. _No_. Addison's head snapped up to stare at her incredulously, trying somehow to get her attention.

_No, Torres. Don't get involved!_

She can't have her in solitary. She doesn't want to be alone.

“Out of the way, bitch.” The woman with the tray shoved against Callie's shoulder, but was taken aback when she didn’t budge.

“Put the tray down.”

“Fuck you!” The woman took a swing with the tray, but Callie easily dodged, letting the woman sprawl over her and grabbing her by the back of her shirt and swinging her against the lip of the table.

Addison tensed, her stomach lurching. That woman probably had friends. Friends who were now standing from their seats at other tables around the cafeteria.

The other woman stood again and squared up, but Callie did not turn towards her.

“You, sit back down.”

"Keep telling me what to do and I'll stab your face off."

The guards continued shouting.

Addison could hear a flock of armoured officers coming from down the hall, door buzzers going off.

She fought the urge to stand and join Callie as she watched other inmates stand, edging closer to Callie and the other woman, chanting _'fight, fight, fight'_. Addison watched as the woman, blood down her head from where she had collided with the table and the first woman's fist, lunged at Callie.

At the same time, several women from the crowd jumped into the struggle. Addison winced when she saw Callie's head snap to one side. Callie grabbed one of the women and punched her squarely in the throat and dropped her to the ground, deflated. She swung her arm around with an open palm, fingers curled, and grabbed another one by her hair.

Armoured police flooded into the cafeteria, screaming and shouting with their big, booming voices, pulling the women apart and throwing them to the ground before they could even really get started.

“Ask any of them, I was trying to stop the fight. It was self-defense!” she heard Callie shouted, over a knee to her back, “I didn't start it!”

The officers escorted several of the women out of the cafeteria, no doubt to file them for disciplinary action. Addison looked down at her friend again, secretly hoping she wouldn’t get too much flack. Callie did have a way of getting around the rules.

"Inmates! Back to your cells!"

“You know why I'm not taking you down to the hole but next time, I will not hesitate,” Addison heard Officer Trent hissed sternly at Callie, manhandling her to her feet roughly, as though she was a ragged doll, weighing nothing, "Stay out of trouble, Torres."

The other women who jumped into the fray were dragged out of chow, most likely taken to SHU.

It was going to be another lockdown, she knew it as they hurried back into their cells, doors buzzing behind them once again.

She didn't know how long they'd be locked in their cells this time.

Callie sat down on her bed, her back to her and wiped her bloody nose as Addison stood there and watched. She stretched her neck and shoulders out, wiping more blood from her cheek and nose again, before swinging her legs over the bed and facing Addison suddenly, catching her off guard. Callie grinned her toothy grin, chin on her hand.

"I'm sorry." Addison quickly said.

"What for?"

"For not having your back."

Callie laughed, light and sweet. “I can fight my own battles, Connecticut.”

“I know but —”

“I told you that you don't have to.”

“I know but —”

"I don't want you to, Addison. It's dangerous. These women are dangerous." she emphasised, "What if you got hurt? ... Or worse? ... I'd never forgive myself."

Callie stared at the purpling bruise that was her cellie's under-eyes. Addison looked thinner, arms still strong, her jaw defined and wrists bony. She knew she hadn't been sleeping and eating well for weeks now.

Addison sat cross-legged in front of Callie, digging through her things and handed her a tube of ointment.

“Where’d you get that?” Callie asked, raising a brow.

She smiled. “Nicked it off the guard's station. It’s for cuts and bruises.”

“So, prison's turned you into a real criminal, huh." Callie joked before transitioning into all seriousness, "But just be careful. If you get caught —”

“You don't have to worry about me.”

Callie's smile softened. “I always worry.”

Addison sighed, getting comfortable next to her on the bed, “Why'd you get involved, anyway?” she asked, sipping her water, one hand lightly rubbing her still churning stomach to will it to quiet down, "The fight."

Callie shrugged one shoulder. The other still hurt; twinged from where her opponent, a stocky woman from Tier 2, whom she'd known for as long as she was here, slammed her into the ground. “Honestly? I was just fucking bored.”

* * *

> **_June 5th,_ **

"Where are you taking me?" Addison hissed as Callie dragged her by the arm down the hallway of Block C.

They weren't allowed to just freely roam around the prison, however, Callie had managed to convince two guards that they were the new cleaning crew, "Torres?"

Callie stopped in her tracks, still holding a bucket of cleaning supplies in one hand, a mop in the other, "Fine," she exhaled, "We're gonna go see a witch."

"A witch?" Addison exclaimed, bemused. She had to not have heard her right because — _a witch?_ It was absolutely preposterous.

"Shh!" Callie shushed her as she leaned in closer, looking around, "Don't say that out loud."

"You're taking me to see a witch, Torres. A witch! I think my reaction is sufficient."

Just then, they heard loud, echoey footsteps coming up towards them and began to pretend mopping the floor. "Missed a spot, inmate." The officer taunted. She knew Callie was biting her cheek to stop herself from mouthing off and getting a shot.

They eyed him until he made a turn and was out of their sights once again.

"Well, technically," Callie started before pausing to think how she should word this properly, "She's a voodoo healer."

"Voodoo? Is she going to make a doll out of me."

"Healer. Voodoo healer." Callie corrected her.

She didn't know that there was a difference. But somehow that sounded way worse because she was not familiar at all with African magic. Though what she knew, as portrayed in movies and, well like everything in the occult, there was always a price to pay.

"No. I'm not going."

"Connecticut, trust me. Please."

Addison frowned, frantically pushing her fingers through her hair. "Fine," she forced herself to say, "Only because I trust you."

After bribing their way into another block, they shuffled along the hallways until Callie found the voodoo healer's cube. She beckoned Addison, who had lagged behind, to hurry up.

"May we come in, Madame Marie Laveau."

_Her name's Marie Laveau? Like the Marie Laveau, Voodoo Queen?_

"You brought payment, child?" the older woman asked. There was something boiling on a stinger, Addison noticed, and she tried her best to not scrunch up her nose; nope, she was going to be sick again.

"Yes, Mama Laveau," Callie said, putting the five packets of soups on the desk before turning to her. "This is Addison. The one I told you about."

"Come closer, my child, let me see you." her eyes were at her general direction but the way she looked at her was as though she was looking right past her; Addison could tell that there were no light behind them.

She was blind.

A clay doll hung by the window above a circle of lit candles, held only by a filmsy piece of string. A strand of blonde hair was stuck to it by sellotape. A few other clay dolls were hung similarly a distance away, many were scattered and piled on the table with pins or nails stuck on various parts of the clay bodies. Addison moved a step back upon realising she almost stepped on one. In fact, several dolls were on the floor as well and not a lot of them had all of their four limbs. It was like they were left there to rot.

She looked at Callie hesitantly, scared, who just gave her a reassuring nod.

"C'mere."

Addison went, crouching down on one knee, and Callie mouthed _'hurry'_ at her.

Madame Marie Laveau placed her hands over her face, barely touching her as she roamed over the expense of her forehead down to her nose then, chin before abruptly coming to halt. "You are frightened." she stated.

"No, I'm not. I'm just —"

"Yes, finish what your sentence."

"No. I mean, yes," Addison changed her mind about lying to the voodoo practitioner, "But not of you. No," she quickly added, "I just don't know why Callie brought me here."

"Don't go worrying your pretty pale head over her. Your friend is worried about you," she said, "And I'm here to help you. Tell me, what's happening to you?"

“I ... I really don't know.'' Addison frowned, fingers twirling on her lap.

"What is the matter with you? Speak up,” she all but demanded, her voice resonating like a lioness scolding a cub.

"Okay. Okay, I'm sorry," she cleared her throat, a little freaked out, "I'm just really nauseous and it's all the time. Not sporadic. Not once or twice. It almost never stops."

"When did it start?"

"Going on three weeks now."

"Is there something particular you are sensitive to?"

"Scent, I guess. Odour. Smell. Certain food."

"Yeah, there are plenty of smells in prison." Callie scoffed.

"Are you nauseated right now?"

Addison closed her eyes, "Yes," she gagged.

"Would you wish to vomit?"

She shook her head. Remembering then that the woman was blind, "No," she said with a hand wrapped around her stomach and another covering her mouth.

Her body then went tight and tense and she struggled to hold her body up as she doubled over, clenching her stomach as it twist and churn painfully.

She gagged and gagged, painfully aware that there were two people in the room and watching her.

"Torres, would you get your friend that bag over there?"

She tried to spit out the contents of her stomach, failing miserably as nothing would come up.

"No, no, I'm fine. It's okay."

"It will not offend me if you do."

"No. It's okay."

She pushed herself away from Madame Marie Laveau, sitting up painfully against the wall as she felt frustration flow through her veins. She closed her eyes in despair, wanting nothing more than to be laying down in her comfortable bed at her apartment with her boyfriend by her side.

"I'm so sorry."

Before Addison found the strength to open her eyes, she felt a comforting hand crawl between her shoulder blades, making her breathe out in relief.

She stayed there for a few moments without moving nor daring to reopen her eyes. She was simply focusing on her breathing, trying to calm herself down as much as she could. Everything seemed so sudden to her, which made her slightly worried about her current condition.

"Nonsense." Madame Marie Laveau said.

Callie nodded in agreement, "Don't be stupid, Connecticut," she said, taking her back to the voodoo healer. Honestly, the only thing she was hoping for at this point was to be lying down in bed, sleeping until this sickness would pass.

"So, you don't like the smell of chicken soup, huh?'' she raised her eyebrow, now sounding more intrigued than before. "Are your breast tender?"

"Please, Madame Marie Laveau. Just tell me what's wrong with me.'' she whispered, thinking she suddenly saw way too many bright stars in her eyes.

"Mama Laveau." she corrected.

"Mama Laveau, please." she spoke up, keeping a hand tightly around her bloated stomach.

Mama Laveau let out a deep sigh, rubbing her arm up and down as if to comfort her. "When was your last menstrual cycle?"

Addison looked to Callie, not wanting to answer that question, also. She nodded hastily, encouraging her to go on with the answer.

"It was, umm, two weeks ago but it was more like spotting than a period," she said, "Can you please tell me what's wrong with me, now?"

Cupping her face gently between her hands and making her look right into her milky eyes, "Usually when someone is _with child_ , they can develop intense reactions and hyper-sensibility to certain tastes or smells. It would explain what is happening to you.''

Addison's eyes grew wide, struggling to believe what she was hearing. She was pretty much expecting everything but that.

_With child?_

She couldn't be pregnant.

She just couldn't.

*** * ***

Maybe deep down she knew.

* * *

> _**June 7th,** _

There was a disconnect between them when Derek came to visit. Both times and both of them could feel it.

It was palpable.

"Inmate 711549."

That was her name here.

**_711549_ **

The guards had taken her from her cell and into the visitation area and yeah, she was more than just nervous and she didn't know why.

Derek was her boyfriend. The love of her life. _So why would it be weird and awkward between them?_

It was like there was a secret. Something unspoken between them. There was basically a plexiglass screen separating them when there wasn't.

"Hi."

She half hugged him when she saw him and wouldn't look him in the eyes. She knew he wanted to hold her longer but all she said was that the guards were watching, which was not untrue. The guards were watching and they weren't not allowed to touch, just permissible to embrace no longer than three seconds.

"Sorry. I stink." she muttered, tucking a lock behind her ear as she sat down on the inmate side of the table, "Couldn't get to the showers."

"No. It’s fine. You smell fine."

"So, umm, Savvy and Weiss are getting married, huh?"

Only happy things were allowed to be discussed when he visited. And that made things limiting, considering how all the happiness was out there. None in here. Addison didn't ask about medical school because that would only remind her of what she'll never have, what she'll never be and Derek didn't ask about Addison's refusal to hug him anymore, or even look him in the eyes.

"You've gotten tan." he said as though noticing for the first time.

Perhaps to fill in the dead silence.

She showed him her blistered and swollen hands. "I wasn't on the beach, if that's what you're thinking." she all but rolled her eyes at him.

Derek didn't say a words to her.

"I'm sorry. I'm just —" _Cranky for no reason. Annoyed and so very hot._

"It's fine."

There was something wrong, something missing. Every time he came down, she was flightier, scanning her eyes everywhere around her and nervously looking at the other inmates beside her with their obviously criminal-looking significant other and she was scared for Derek. Scared because Grey was looking at her with a smug smirk on her face right now.

Running her fingers through her greasy hair, she groaned, "It's just that someone's staring over here."

"At us?"

She nodded. "Yeah. But she's nobody. She's been harassing me since I got here," Derek's eyes grew wide at that, "We fought. It was nothing." she reassured him.

"Were you hurt?"

Shaking her head, "Not really. Just bruised, a split lip." she pointed to her upper lip, where the cut had been.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

In truth, he didn't really want to know; ignorance is bliss, remember? Watching the woman he loves, unarmed, locked up with all these murdered, it was just too much for him.

"I didn't want to worry you. It was noth —"

Derek interrupted her, "Oh, oh, I think she's coming over here." he said, looking up at Meredith with a confused look when she stopped right behind Addison's chair.

"Hi, I'm Meredith Grey." she said, extending her hand out to Derek, who looked at Addison then back at Meredith with uncertainty.

Addison turned around, exasperated and pushed Meredith's hand away. "What is it that you want, Grey?"

"Rude, Montgomery." Meredith pouted, a mock hurt look on her face as she rubbed her hand at the place where Addison had slapped.

"What do you want?" she asked again, tiredly.

“Looks like you’ve got an admirer,” Meredith said, a knowing smile on her face as she cocked her head to Karev's direction.

Her eyes furrowed at Meredith.

“What?”

“That guard, Karev, seem to be eyeing ya quite a bit. He's always in your cell. Care to tell us something about that?” She wiggled her brows at the suggestion, twirling her hair with a finger.

Addison's eyes shot to Karev, then, at Meredith, who in return gave her a smile, all teeth, but no kindness.

Addison closed her eyes, groaning, this was Meredith's way of getting back at her with what had happened with Karev in her cell the other day.

“It’s … It’s nothing like that, Derek," she started, voice low and panicking, "It's — It's ..."

It really, really wasn’t.

Derek just looked at the chaotic mess right in front of him with bewilderment as though he wanted to run.

“Oh, what, no? H-he’s not your type? Come on. If you’re gonna fuck a guard, any guard, it gotta be Karev,” she chuckled, “Or Trent. ‘Cause I’ve seen him hanging around too. Are brunettes more your type, then?”

"Grey! Get back to your table." an officer shouted.

Meredith snickered, walking away to her table.

"What is she talking about, Addison?"

 _Shit_.

* * *

> _**June 9th,** _

Addison lobbed her balled up paper towel at the wastebasket. Probably a bit harder than she meant to, but then again, she was so truly fucking sick of this. She was so sick of getting accused of things. She was sick of Callie accusing her of being pregnant, of Mama Laveau's, and Meredith suggesting in front of Derek that she was sleeping around. She was sick of being sick, and more so of not even having a goddamned word for whatever was wrong with her.

"You have your head in the sand, Connecticut. And I spent a year with a girl who believed this was a commune."

"It's just an inhuman amount of things to handle all at the same time," Addison said and buried herself in her cup of black tea. It was the only thing she could stomach right now. "My emotions have been all over the place, I'm still sick with … whatever this is. Yoga's not really helping with much of anything, and my relationship with Derek is in shambles because of Meredith Grey. And that's not even all of what's going on for me; I can't even get blood tests or something that might help diagnose it because do you know where am I?"

"You're in prison."

"I'm in prison." Addison repeated, nodding, "Yes. But let me tell you, I'm not pregnant."

"Let's entertain the idea of this being not pregnancy, okay," one of Callie's friend's, Araceli, suggested _(after getting back to their block from their visit to the local witch, Addison was just fuming at Callie, dragging her to the showers, 'Why would you do that? What would you bring me there? She's crazy. I'm not pregnant' she had all but loudly hissed, and Araceli had heard them)_ , and at least she laughed at the idea, because if she hadn't, it'd meant it was a possibility.

"Yeah, no, but really," Araceli said and reached over to squeeze Addison's hand, "if we're talking about this seriously? I have no idea what to think it is, and I just hope it's not something completely awful. And it's all the better if you can get it cleared up quickly."

"Pregnancy isn't entirely out of the question, though." Callie huffed and set her plastic cup down, holding it with both hands and brushing her thumbs up and down the handle, "And I really think it's not a bad suggestion. All of the symptoms add up, and the timing would be right, wouldn't it —"

"Except that it isn't," Addison snapped, coming off harsher than she intended because of the nagging sensation in the back of her head — the one that prodded at her and reminded her that Callie might be right, "I'm not pregnant, Torres. I don't understand your obsession because it isn't happening. The timing would not be right. And it's too hard to tell because I have always been irregular —"

"And have you had your moon time lately, Princess Dewdrop Moonflower?" Callie seemed to think that she was being incredibly clever, and she had to sigh when all Addison did was stare at her. "If you're going to act like a hippie about this, then I'm going to call you by a hippie name," she explained, "You're trying to solve this by ignoring it and throwing dumb solutions for other things at it, which is what hippies do. Or are you just intentionally ignoring the part where a baby is kind of a serious issue."

"There is no baby!" Addison hissed, and even if she didn't raise her voice, she let her eyes dart around the rec centre, just to make sure that no one was eavesdropping on this unadulerated nonsense.

Addison ran her hand back through her hair, trying to shove it away from her face, and leaned in across the table, closer to Callie so she could speak even quieter. So there's even less of a chance that someone could overhear and go sticking their nose into this conversation.

"That's not going to happen to me, Torres," she told her, glaring. "There is no baby, I am not pregnant, and whatever I have going on? It is infinitely more serious than a damned baby. So are you going to help me, and support me in this, and be my friend — or are you going to keep being a smart-ass about it?"

"I'm trying to be your friend about it," she drawled and wrinkled her nose at her. Pulled a face like she had just sucked on twenty lemons. "The problem here is that reality doesn't go away just because you want it to — and neither do babies, as far as I know."

Addison huffed, slouching back into her seat and continuing to glare at her. Callie was being ridiculous, of course she was - but on the other hand? So was she. And as they finish their tea in agitated silence, the nagging thought that she might be right refuses to just shut up and go away.


	7. Chapter 7

**Out of Sight, Out of Mind**

* * *

_**Chapter Seven** _

_"Who's the father?"_

* * *

> _**June 11th,** _

If she didn't intervene and did something soon, Callie knew her cellie would deny it further until she'd be helping her make a bloody mess, pulling a human out of her in their shared cell.

As much as she hated to admit it, Callie was becoming concerned for her cellie's mental and physical state — she was barely eating, constantly throwing up, more particularly at night than in the morning, and was sleeping through the entire day when she could.

She was so delusional to her own denial that she had convinced herself that it was much more serious than a baby.

So, Callie did something Addison should have done, herself, weeks ago, which was to get a form from an officer at the guards' station to book for an appointment to see the nurse. And when Officer Karev knocked on their cell door to take Addison to see the nurse, Callie looked away, pretending to mind her own business.

"No. I didn't put in a sick call."

"Ohh-kay," Karev said, clearly confused as he looked from the chart in his hand to Addison, "Nope. It says here that you did. Two weeks ago."

"Two weeks ago ..." she knew this had to be Callie's doing. "Torres? Why would you do this?"

"You said you were dying, right? Let's see if you really are. Prove me wrong."

Addison stumbled into her work boots and splashed some cold water on her face, trying to look alive. She'd prove Callie wrong.

She wasn't pregnant.

It was impossible.

She felt nauseous, and the prison uniform was starting to feel too tight (although she wouldn’t put it past the officers to have purposefully given her a size too small), she stepped back when she heard a buzz and the door opened. She followed Karev in silence into a long maze of hallways and when they reached the nurses' office, he told her to wait in line with all the other girls.

" _ **711549**_ , Montgomery Addison."

When it was her turn, she was greeted by an overworked nurse, who looked like she didn't want to be there. Addison told the nurse, whose name tag said Cristina, of her symptoms and was told to pee in a cup. But before that, she was given a gown to change into.

Sitting on the table with a paper-thin gown that could disintegrate into nothingness, she waited for Nurse Cristina to come back.

This had to be one of the worst and longest moments of her life. She sat there, breathing and not doing much else for awhile. Her eyes were kept closed, lashes sticky with adhesive. Somehow this didn't feel like much of a blessing; if only she could sort through the tidal roar of noise in her head to figure out what was happening to her.

"There," Nurse Cristina said slowly, still flipping through the papers on her chart as she walked back in, "That's it. You're pregnant."

She took a deep breath. Surely, she had heard it wrong.

_You're pregnant._

_Could you be pregnant?_

_Usually when someone is with child, they can develop intense reactions and hyper-sensibility to certain tastes or smells. It would explain what is happening to you._

She blinked at the nurse in confusion and shook her head. “I’m sorry. I don’t think I heard that correctly.”

“You are pregnant."

For all the buildup, the result was so anticlimactic that She sat there, breathing or she thought she was.

"That's why you've been sick."

Vaguely, Addison wanted to punch something, but that desire only lasted a few moments. She felt like crying, but no tears slipped at that moment.

All of her thoughts, her feelings disappeared. Everything went blank — and Addison shuddered. She was really not even sure she was still alive because something inside of her, something fundamental, felt dead. _You're pregnant._ She felt it though, the pain, the panic, the Earth-shattering truth, so most of her must still be on this Earth.

"No. No. No. No. No, that's not possible." she said all in one breath.

Addison shook her head, tried to shut away all of the horrible things — lies, these were lies — crowding into her mind. Something felt like it was pressing down on her chest and she was having a hard time catching her breath.

Suddenly everything was blurry again, like before. She was dizzy, spiralling. She needed to get out of here. Not out of this room, but this prison. She didn't belong here. She needed to go.

She still must not have heard the nurse right. It was not right.

"I'm not pregnant. You must have it all wrong or you have the results mixed up with someone else's. I'm on birth control." Was on. "I can't be pregnant. I'm in prison." she tried to inhale but couldn't.

"Those two are not mutually exclusive, dear." she said to her before calling for an officer to escort her back to her cell.

_Derek._

She needed Derek. She needed to hear him. She needed to grab onto him and not let go. She couldn't do this. This couldn't be real. This wasn't real. She needed to wake up from this nightmare.

_This wasn't real._

*** * ***

When Callie looked up again, Addison had returned with a different officer. The door was buzzed open and she saw her face; Addison was trying her best to halt the tears from spilling. She didn't need to see the results, didn't need to ask her what had happened because her face told her everything in one silent exchange. Still, she asked the question anyway.

“Everything alright?”

Shaking her head, “I’m pregnant.” she murmured.

Callie refrained from saying _'I told you so'_.

“Oh, Connecticut. Honey, I’m so sorry.”

Addison collapsed onto Callie's bed, sprawled on the mattress next to her. She shivered, hands drifting over her flat stomach, before she buried her face into her hands, repressing the urge to scream.

"This is so unfair, Torres," Addison cried softly, "Why? What am I supposed to do? I don't know how I'm going to have this baby. What's going to happen?"

"I don't know."

"I can't be pregnant. I just — I can't have a baby. Not right now."

“Are you leaving this facility?” Callie asked, her voice sounding so sad to her own ears and it wasn't what she wanted — she was not going to get emotional right now and make this about her and her broken heart if Addison were to leave.

Putting a hand on Addison's shoulder reassuringly, Addison threw her arms around Callie's, burying her face into her neck.

 _No._ Callie wasn't about to make this all about her, even though it'd make her very sad if she left.

She might not ever get to see her again. They'll go their separate ways and then ...

She didn't know what to do, what to think, what to say.

Nine weeks had passed, and Addison was on her tenth week of imprisonment. Not that she knew that, time had become meaningless sometime around the second week. But that would mean that she is around eleven weeks.

Addison was aware of Callie holding her, rubbing her back, but only barely. Almost nothing gets past the barrier of Callie's cigarettes smell, the first of many sobs that Addison choked out, and the overwhelming rush of tears.

"No. I don't know. But I don't think they're transferring me anywhere."

Without question, this revelation was the second worst thing to have ever happened to her.

*** * ***

That night when they were asleep, a CO told them to switch beds.

"Why?" Addison grumbled, rubbing her eyes and half asleep.

"Because you're pregnant, Montgomery! We can't have you on the top bunk, now can we?"

She supposed not.

That was a lawsuit waiting to happen.

And now, whenever she would leave her cell, everyone would glare daggers at her like she was the lowest of all lows for getting herself pregnant and putting her unborn child in harm's way.

She didn't need everyone else's judgment and shrewdness when all she'd been doing was beating herself up for allowing this to happen (she'd always been so careful) ever since she found out yesterday. You're pregnant. You're with child. And now, most of everyone in her block knows — they knew because the stupid CO had been so fucking loud last night, and also because, of course, gossip spread like wildfire in here.

* * *

> **_June 13th,_ **

"Connecticut, stop pacing please, you're making me dizzy."

"I can't be pregnant. This isn't fucking happening." she kept repeating that line as she walked three steps up and down the cell, trying to somehow convince herself of that once again.

"I can't be pregnant. I can't be pregnant."

It had been two days since she saw the nurse and for the past forty-eight hours, Addison had been really quiet. She kept to herself and was more in shock than anything, really. She wanted to be sure with how she felt before completely going mad. But now, there was no longer any doubt, nor any hope for normality (however normal it can be considering she is in prison); she was in panic mode.

She was pregnant with Derek's child. And there was no way in hell she was keeping it.

_Right?_

"I'm not keeping it. I'm going to get me an appointment to see the nurse again tomorrow and I'm going to tell her that I want an abortion." she stared at Callie desperately, needing confirmation, needing to be heard, to get this over with in a record time.

"Will you sit with me for five minutes?" Callie sighed, walking into her space and sitting on her bed, patting on the empty space on her right.

She must have forgotten that that wasn't her bed anymore, but Addison didn't really care about all that rules when it came to her cellmate.

Callie ran her hand through her dark hair, waiting for Addison to settle down by her side, "Just listen to me, alright?"

Addison was trying her best to proceed the information, but her brain was screaming, which kept her mind away from thinking properly. She kept walking in nonsense circles for a minute, before finally turning back to look at Callie.

"Are you going to try and talk me into changing my mind? If so, I'm not." she informed her quite directly, knowing she was defiantly mature enough to make her own decisions. Especially when it came to her body and future.

"I won't." she half lied, pushing over slightly so Addison would have more space. "Now come sit, I just wanna have a tiny conversation."

Addison sighed, rolling her eyes in annoyance before finally crashing down by Callie's hip. She looked at her with both her arms crossed over her chest, seeming completely closed to any type of negotiation. Callie swallowed the lump of nerves that was forming in her throat, licking her lips and clearing her lungs before speaking up.

"I understand why you want to get an abortion ... but I really think you should talk to Derek before doing anything crazy." she tried being convincing with her advice, wanting Addison to make a decision for herself, but also for Derek.

"I know but what he doesn't know won't hurt him, right?" Addison stated more as a question, hoping for some sort of an agreement with her statement.

"But the truth always has a way of coming out."

Deep down, she knew making the decision alone was selfish, but telling Derek would make things way too real.

"Look, you love Derek, don't you?" she asked, obviously knowing the answer.

Addison simply nodded, face falling to the ground. The anxiety was now crawling deeply under her skin, making her feel even more sick than she initially was.

"Then, what are you scared of?"

"Everything." the redhead almost whispered, feeling a cold tear gently making its way along her sharp cheek bone. She hated how she no longer had control on her emotions.

They're going to take my baby away from me.

She hadn't cried since she got here. Hadn't cried when she was at her sentencing. Hadn't cried since finding out she was with child. Addison could feel her fists close tighter together, pushing her nails into the skin of her palms until it was painful. The frustration and anger was boiling up in her blood and making her heart pump.

Callie didn't understand.

No one fucking did.

"You've had your five minutes, Torres." she spoke sharply, no longer seeing the point in speaking about the obvious when she already had a well defined plan drawn in her mind.

Callie felt her heart shatter at her cellie's rough tone, hoping she could have been more convincing. She simply nodded, feeling completely out of arguments and resources. But she still had one more strategy — the truth.

_Abortion while in prison?_

_unheard of_

Addison watched as Callie went back up to her own bed, and she collapsed on hers, the bottom bunk, without taking the care to shake away from her clothes. She stared above, secretly wishing she could still be six years old to escape all these idiotic grown up problems.

She couldn't sleep and she guessed so did Callie because she started speaking again. "You don't have a choice, Montgomery. I'm not trying to be mean here, I just want you to know the truth. You don't have Plan B here. You don't have a choice. They don't give us tampons — we have to practically beg for them every month and that's basic necessities. You think the state is going to pay for your abortion?"

She'd find a way.

Her parents. Her own money.

"I'm in this with you. I want you to know that." she whispered so only Addison could hear, wanting her to know that she wasn't alone and that they would overcome everything together, as one. "Whatever happens."

* * *

> **June 19th,**

"Torres! Torres! Dios mio, does the vomiting ever stop? Make her stop or I'm gonna stop her myself!" she heard Valencia from the cell next to theirs, through a haze as she woke up from her sleep, "It's every single night! I can't sleep! None of us can!"

"You have something to say to me, Valencia! Say it to my face!" Callie heard her cellie shout, her voice croaking and weak.

Callie was concerned. Her cellie had not talked to her in days, not since the talk they had and she was afraid that perhaps Addison was angry at her. She'd been thinking, Callie knew that and wanted space and so, she had given Addison just that. Space. But something wasn't right with Addison; she'd been excessively sick lately. She saw the way Addison moved slower, how she slept more often. She'd been moved to laundry duty because field duty wouldn't obviously be swell for a pregnant woman. Her ability to keep down food was troubling. The girl was losing weight, which was painfully obvious. Callie had been worried, but tried not to say anything.

Addison may have a tendency to be reckless and keep things to herself sometimes but this didn't only involve her now.

"Connecticut?" she asked, slipping down the top bunk, "Connecticut, are you all right?"

The noise she received in response was no comfort at all — another miserable groan. Addison was curled up on the floor, her knees drawn as close to her chest as she could manage, her head tipped back against the wall.

Kneeling before her, her chest growing tight with concern, she took one of her hands. It was clammy, but not limp — the moment she touched her, Addison clung to her hand with a grip like vice. "Connecticut, what's wrong with you?"

She shrugged, her eyes still shut tight. "Dizzy."

"Oh." Callie eased herself down next to her, sliding her free arm around Addison. Addison in turn curled into her embrace, burying her face in her shoulder. "You want me to get you a guard? I can pester them until they get a nurse up here."

"No. I don't know." Addison's voice occasionally took on a sing-song quality when she was annoyed and doing her best to tamp that down. The timbre of her voice at that moment was oddly similar, a strained melodic note buoying the words. She shrugged again, pointing somewhere in the direction of the toilet. "I don't see what the — ugh — what more the world wants from me. I already threw up dinner."

Callie glanced in the direction of her pointing and nodded. "You sure did. Want to get back to bed, or d'you think you're gonna be sick again?"

"I don't know," she repeated.

Addison didn't move, so neither did she, except to stroke her back as she held onto her. There was a thin sheen of sweat over her skin — Callie wondered how long she'd been retching before she woke up. She wasn't sure how long they sat there on the hard cement either, but just as her ass was well and truly starting to fall asleep, she heard Addison ask, "Could you help me up?"

"Yeah. Yeah, 'course. Come on." she helped her up and walked her two steps back to bed, where she curled back into a little ball the minute she hit the crappy mattress, "I'll make you some tea."

"How? We don't have hot water."

"All I need is a stinger," she whispered, making sure to not have the guards hear her.

Stingers were contraband _(well, anything that had been altered were considered contraband)_ , so that means a write up or a trip to SHU.

"Torres," she whined, "Is it something that would get us in trouble?"

"It comes in handy during winter. Where'd you think we get hot water?"

They took away the microwave years ago when an inmate heated up packets of mayonnaise and threw it at another inmates' face. Callie literally watched as her face melted off. That was why everything here could only be lukewarm.

"I'll teach you how to make one. All you need to do is get an electrical cord from laundry tomorrow."

"How?"

She knew it was a stupid question but she asked away.

"Just yank one out from the machines when no one's looking."

Addison rolled her eyes at her, "I'll keep a look out for you." she said.

She sure had been learning a lot about the 'prison ways' since she got here.

*** * ***

"How're you feeling?" she asked, coming to sit down at the edge of her side of the bed.

Addison took the cup of tea from Callie, held it close to her lips, and inhaled. Just the scent was enough to relax her, eyes closing softly, and she sighed again, far more pleasantly this time.

"A little better. Thank you, Callie, for this nail clippers infused tea." she said behind the cup, smiling.

"Hey. I got it brand new from commissary. It's never been used before." she patted her knee and watched as she took a careful sip of her drink.

She looked down at the liquid in her cup, coloured a rich reddish-brown. "This is surprisingly nice."

They sat there in the quiet, Addison sipping her tea, until she murmured, "I don't know why I've got to be sick now — I was fine enough until this week."

"Isn't that, uh, just part of having a baby?" Callie was familiar with the process, seen it herself — Addison wasn't the only woman to ever be pregnant in prison.

"At the beginning," she told her. She leaned, groaning. "If I'm correct, I'm almost twelve weeks along."

"It happens sometimes, Connecticut. Everyone's different," Callie assured her, "Nothing to worry about. Aren't you a doctor? Don't you know about these things?"

"They fucking kicked me out, remember?"

"I remember."

"You think if I paid the dean a visit when I get out he'd shit himself?"

"Um. Yes," Callie chuckled, "I'd like to see that happen. But is he worth you violating parole?" The way Addison was she definitely will get out early on parole, "Last time I checked intimidation is a crime."

Addison sighed. "I guess you're right. But I'll never forget what he ... tried —"

"Hey," Callie interrupted, "forget about that dick. How about you lay back down, um?” she suggested.

"Fine. I just hope I'll be able to sleep."

"Hey, there, Baby Connecticut," Callie told the baby, setting aside any notion of feeling like an ass talking to her cellie's middle, "give it a rest for tonight. Your mother needs her sleep. So do I, and half of the girls in here, for that matter."

* * *

> **_June 22nd,_ **

Callie knew why she was in prison. She knew why the person across from her was here, and the woman glaring at her right now. Every single one of these people showed clear signs that they belonged here. Mistakes or just that one bad decision that landed them here, except well, for her cellmate.

_How and why the hell did she end up in prison?_

Callie didn't know.

She rested her cheek on her palm and sighed a little. She was shamelessly watching Addison sipping gently from her cup, eyes considering.

Addison was gorgeous, she had quite unexpectedly stolen her breath away, only realising recently that the fluttering of her heart was because her.

She knew her feelings, now. She knew she loved her. She knew she wanted to spend every minute of the rest of her life with her. She wanted to hold her, and dance with her, and braid her hair, and cook her food, and hold her hand as they walk, bear her burdens, and sleep beside her, and press her lips to hers, and ask her to be with her, someday.

But that could never happen.

Callie was sure Addison loved Derek, will always love him, and now, they were having a kid together. And not to mention, she was straight as an arrow. And she knew she'd be the last person on earth for Addison, who saw her as strictly platonic and nothing more, and she was fine with that.

She was a knight to a princess, here to serve and protect.

_What was she doing pining over her straight and pregnant cellmate, anyway?_

Addison had got an expression on her face that said that she was about to retch and blech and when she actually did, making a small, soft sound in the back of her throat, gagging on a rubbery piece of egg that she had forked into her mouth, an officer called her out and forced her out of the chow hall.

"But, wait, I wasn't finished."

"You look about done to me, Inmate."

Addison had a look on her face again, one that she only got when she was trying to figure out how to say something she was not sure she should.

_Just walk away, Connecticut. Walk away._

It was a normal morning, and now as she returned back to her cell, Addison didn't say a word to her and neither did she in days.

The look on her face was worrying, though. She still had been really quiet, in thought and cranky mostly and hardly talking to anyone since she was told that she was expecting and Callie, out of everyone, would indeed understand the magnitude of that statement; _you're pregnant. Congratulations? Or my condolences?_

Addison looked up at her. Callie smiled reassuringly.

_It was all going to be fine._

But Callie knows it’s not.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dubious consent/harassment ahead.

**Out of Sight, Out of Mind**

_**Chapter Eight** _

_"Solitary confinement looks a lot like torture"_

* * *

> _**June 26th,** _

Addison is dragged down a corridor, hands holding her tight, cuffs purposefully cutting into her wrists. She's been here three months and this is the first time she's really truly felt the brute force of the prison officers. They're used to dealing with dangerous, drugged up offenders, women who have killed. Now, she's in their sights, she's defied their authority and she knows that she's going to be chucked into the hole for a long time. There's no appeal, no recourse, no Callie to help her out, save her and roll her eyes at her.

The price for being wrong here is a high one.

She's still numb from her stupidity, cannot feel her hands, still; she's risked everything, thrown away what's left of her freedom and _what for?_

They take her to a small room, uncuff her and order her to strip down. She looks around. There are three of them, three big women with muscles on muscles on muscles, in the room with her, they're taking no chances. She wants to resist, to protest, to try and regain some form of human dignity but she knows if she does she'll be face down on the floor and they'll strip her anyway.

She slowly takes off her prison blues first, kicking them away when she's told. She pushes down her undergarments and steps out of them, leaving her standing naked before them. She's never liked having to do this, being exposed to scrutiny, but it's something she's had to do regularly here.

Coming back from visitations entails a strip search. Also, if you're looking suspicious or if the officers thinks you're 'hiding' something. If they search your cell and you are found with contraband, you and your cellmate will be getting searched. Lockdown equals to a search and that take hours. And like now, going into solitary confinement.

When she stands naked before them she's told to turn around and clasp her hands behind her head and she's cuffed again, their hands coolly efficient on her wrists. She's told to leave her hands there and while she stands like that she's searched. It's swift and business-like. Fingers run through her hair and probe into her mouth when she opens it on command. Gloved hands examine her body, under her breasts. A hand presses on her back and she's bent over, her cheeks spread apart and a lubed finger inserted inside and she is demanded to cough. Just like a medical exam, she tells herself. It's not an assault, it's an exam. At least they're quick about it.

She's given her white, clean prison issue t-shirt back, the one with **_711549_** on it, then a forest green uniform, much like she's seen on any prison show ever. She's uncuffed again and told to dress.

She dresses much more quickly than she disrobed and puts on the uniform thankfully. The hands-behind-your-head cuffing manoeuvre is repeated and then an officer bends down with a leg chain in their hands.

Addison finds her voice for the first time and protests, "Hey, you people batoned me in the knee, I'm not going to run anywhere."

The officer pauses in his work, looking up at his boss who just signals to 'go ahead'.

Addison tenses up and the officer seems to sense this and hurriedly finishes putting the shackles on her ankles. Addison wonders if they're going to fix the ankle chain to a belly chain, and whether she will be able to walk if they do so but thankfully they seem satisfied with what they've done. She can walk like this, just barely, a lame shuffle at best.

"If I fall, and lose this baby, I'll sue the hell out of this place and each an every one of you." she says to no one.

They don't pay any mind to her threats but she can feel their grip tightening on her arms.

Just in case, she thinks.

 _Suckers_.

She's taken out of the room, down a corridor and past a row of steel doors, close together, a single number printed on the outside of each. As they pass the doors there's noise, women calling from inside those tiny cells, heckling the guards, heckling Addison, or maybe just making noise because that's all they can do. The guards on either side of her seem unmoved by the noise, they're used to it, when Addison's step falters they tighten their grip on her arms and move her forward, almost dragging.

They stop in front of the last cell on this corridor and she looks at the door. _D22_ , her new home. In a minute she'll be going in there, alone, with no idea when she'll be coming out again. She swallows heavily, she's scared, her heart is pounding and the reality of what's about to happen is hitting her.

She'd been scared when she'd been taken to her cell in the general population part of the prison, but she knew she'd be able to leave it for at least some portion of each day. She knows from talking to her fellow prisoners that she'll be in this cell for 23 hours every day.

The door is a heavy, red, steel one, sliding open at a command from the control unit, she sees the small cell beyond and tenses up, she's never liked being shut in small places, the cell back in gen pop was bad enough; this is so much worse. It's narrow and cramped and she doesn't know how she's going to survive in here.

The officers tighten their grip on her arms again, as if expecting her to make a break for it, and despite her apprehension she feels a sliver of amusement.

_Where's she going to go exactly? Limp down the corridor at a speed a turtle would be able to beat?_

She's told to enter the cell and she does so, still cuffed. The door slams shut and she's ordered to the cuff port, a small slot in the cell door. She puts her hands through the port and the cuffs are undone and removed. The cuff port slams shut and she's alone.

They haven't talked to her, beyond barked commands. No one's told her how long this will be, she wonders if they even know.

She looks around the cell. There's not much to see, a bed made of poured concrete along one wall, barely long enough for her, a thin mattress, a single blanket, a well worn pillow. The usual steel toilet in a corner, a tiny sink, a single roll of toilet paper, a rough towel. At the bottom of the bunk there's a pile of green jumpsuits, and when she counts them she finds there's eight.

She glances at the small window set high in one wall, it's been painted over, she can't even catch a glimpse of the outside world.

She lies down on the hard bed and stares at the ceiling, listening to the faint hiss of the ventilation system.

She's still riding the high from what she'd done.

It was reckless and foolish but unexpected, even for her. She had never felt that much anger before. Hell, she literally saw red. She never thought she'd live through the day when she understands that expression.

Prison just brings out the worse in people, she guesses.

She's sore all over, from the fight and the handling of the prison officers when they were subduing her in the chow hall. There's dried blood on her face and chest and arms, and over everything there's the screaming of her knee.

It could very well be a fracture.

She rubs her knee and tries not to think about the pain. To distract herself, her hand goes over her flat belly. The baby is fine, she tells herself. As fine as it can be, considering it's in prison with her. She don't think her baby got hurt, no one touched her but the officers, during the kerfuffle. Everything feels the same with a hint of nausea, of course; it's a constant.

She hears footsteps outside and looks up hopefully at the door, maybe they've changed their mind, realised she was only trying to defend herself and wasn't a danger to anyone. She doesn't need to be punished.

There's the sound of a metal door being unlocked and then the food slot at the bottom of the door opens and a tray is slid in; the door shuts again.

She stares at the tray, it's the usual prison tray with the usual prison slop on it. She doesn't want it.

She looks back at the ceiling.

_What the hell was she thinking?_

Her 'good time' gained has been wasted, good and gone and thrown out the window now.

* * *

> **_June 27th,_ **

She's barely slept all night, the pain in her knee kept her awake and on edge. Not to mention all the screaming and shouting that echoes in here. The sounds alone is enough to make any person go crazy.

People were screaming in the adjacent cells, shouting obscenities and damning the guards for putting them in this hellhole. The lonely florescent light in the ceiling was flickering endlessly, zapping like it was killing bugs with each flit.

Cold, bright and loud. That’s what SHU is like.

Her hands are trembling, her mouth is dry, her stomach is aching and her palms are sweaty. When she looks in the small square of aluminium tacked to the wall that serves as a mirror she can see that her eyes are red and her expression is drawn.

She looks like shit. And she feels like one, too.

She sits on the bunk, cold, shaking hands clasped between her knees, shivering, waiting for something to change, for something to happen. They can't just leave her here like this, she needs ... something. A shower. Fresh air. She's entitled to it.

She's afraid.

She hears heavy booted footsteps approaching her door and she looks up, her heart rate quickening. The footsteps stop outside the door and her name is called. She goes to the cuff port, awkwardly turning her back and placing her hands there when ordered. Cuffs go around her wrists, biting at the flesh. When her hands are safely secured behind her back, the door is opened and an officer stands there with a pill cup; another officer waits out of range.

"Medication," the officer says, his eyes sweeping over Addison and the cell, as if he's checking for danger, or contraband, or maybe, she's hiding someone out here.

She eyes the pills in the cup suspiciously, "I'm not on medication," she says.

The officer looks unbothered when he answers, "Everyone in the hole takes a pill."

"I-I'm pregnant. I'm not taking that unless I know what it is."

"You either take it or we shove it down your throat." the other officer to the side says, "Don't forget who and where you are, _inmate_."

The paper cup is held to her lips and the pills are tipped into her mouth. A paper cup of water is held up and she drinks from it.

"Open." the officer says, indicating for her to open her mouth and she does open her mouth wide so they can check that she’s swallowed the pill.

"How long am I going to be here?" she asks but is unsurprised when she's ignored and they leave, with the door clanging shut behind them.

She fears for one moment that they won't release her from the handcuffs but they do without incident and then the cuff port is shut and she's alone. She shakes out her hands and arms, glad to be free again and spits out the pill she hid in the back of her mouth, in between her cheek and gum.

She lies back down and sleeps most of the day away.

*** * ***

"When can I see a doctor?"

"When you get out."

"Your people smashed my knee in with a baton. It's swollen now. I can hardly walk."

"Then, maybe don't start a fight, _inmate_."

She grits her teeth, internally rolling her eyes. She did not start that fight. She doesn't start fights. She doesn't like fights.

No one listens here.

But there is no point in screaming that over and over again.

"When will I get out, then?"

"When we let you out."

* * *

> _**June 28th,** _

Now that the initial fear has subsided, boredom sets in.

Her morning meal, not for the food itself or the smell that whiffs in, but for the door opening and the prison officers standing there. The brief human interaction. The guy with the food tray doesn't talk much and Addison doesn't recognise him, but he's a human being, a face, someone to affirm that she hasn't just been chucked in here to rot, to be forgotten about, forever. She glances at the name on the officer's uniform - Jones.

"How long am I going to be here?" she asks again, not expecting an answer but just wanting to prolong this period of contact.

Jones shrugs, his eyes never leaving Addison. "Until we let you out."

"I have rights, you know. I haven't had exercise, or a shower since you put me in here."

"Showers are every Friday and Tuesday. You're on lockdown for the first seventy-two hours so you'll go to exercise tomorrow. After that you'll go to exercise once a day for one hour.”

Addison is relieved to hear about the exercise, not the shower because thats two more days _(she hadn't showered in four days already)_. But she is looking for any excuse to get out of this tiny cell.

"I need something to do here. A book to read. Whatever it is. And I'll need some paper and a pen, pretty sure those are guaranteed under the Bill of Rights. If it's too much trouble, I can go fetch them myself."

Jones looks at her like she's something that has been scraped off the bottom of his shoe.

"You get 'em when you earn them. If you got any complaints, you can fill in a form. Now shut the hell up and move away from the door."

Addison stands there stubbornly for a moment and Jones tenses and glances towards his silent partner who is standing just out of range. His hand goes to his hip, where there is a mace sprayer. Addison rolls her eyes and takes a step back, she doesn't want to risk her eyes being on fire.

"I'd still need a pen for that form, don't I?"

The door slides back into place with a clang, there's the awkwardness with getting the cuffs off and then she hears the officers' footsteps fade as they move back along the tier.

There's silence again in her small cell. She thinks it's rather like being trapped in a tiny bathroom, that's about the size of the place. She looks at the window again, and wonders why it's been painted over.

_What was harmful about inmates getting a small glimpse of the sky?_

She paces in the small space between the bunk and the wall, waiting for something to happen. If she stretches her hands out to either side she can reach the walls and she does that for a while, weight on one leg, head down. After she's had her fill of that she paces some more and then lies back down on the bed, hoping to sleep again, at least it will pass some time.

*** * ***

Hours passes without a living soul talking to her, besides the officers telling her what meal they were sending through. No one in the adjacent cells makes a single sound that's meant only for her ears, though she is left to endure their endless screaming.

Her mind is starting to fog over. Thoughts are becoming heavy and unclear whenever she tries to follow them. _Was time even passing?_ She isn't so sure. It could be early, or the middle of the night, she had no way of knowing.

They keep the lights on to confuse and daze the inmates and it works.

She doesn't know what time it is.

Footsteps sounds out in the hallway and it isn't anything new. It can very well be a guard, an inmate being transferred or cleaning the floor, or even a fucking ghost for all she cares.

But then, there it is. The familiar constriction of her chest like a weather forecaster telling her of an upcoming storm with thunderstorms and hail the size of golf balls. It is like a warning, a telling. And that's when the door pulls open.

She shoots up to a sitting position, moving back with her knees up as a protective barrier. She ignores the throbbing in her knee firing through her at the sudden jostling, too preoccupied with Officer Trent and the other CO she's never seen before smirking and standing in the doorway.

“Addison,” Officer Trent nods, taking the first step into her cell, the other following close behind. “Good evening,” he says.

"What do you want?"

“The officers seem to have forgotten to search you before bringing you down here,” he says, coolly, “We can’t have that, now, can we?”

It's been how many days already - _Two? Three?_ She can't be too sure but she's ninety-eight percent certain.

She trembles. _Was he going to search her? Just a pat down, though, right?_ Only female COs were allowed to do the strip-searches. He can’t do that.

"I don't understand. I was searched. They searched me." she repeats, "They strip searched me. The whole thing. I'd fucking remember that."

"Well, the paperwork here seems to be lost, inmate."

"I mean no disrespect, Officer -"

"Sir."

"I don't know what you want from me, sir."

“Against the wall, inmate,” Trent says with a sideways nod to the wall beside him.

"Is there a female officer at least?"

"No, there isn't,” Trent says, “And even if there was, we are under no obligation to comply. This is solitary confinement, you take what you get. Don’t make me come in there and drag your ass out.”

The giant man doesn't look all too pleased with her, and she really doesn't want to know what being dragged out of her cell feels like.

She's heard it through the walls at least once a day and it doesn't sound all that jolly.

She doesn't know what to do. _Should she just go along with it and hope for the best, or should she fight? Could she fight?_

“Now, inmate,” Trent says firmly.

She stands up on unsteady feet, shuffling along towards the officers still standing in the doorway, looking at them with pure disgust. Both men just followed her slow limping with their eyes, but doesn't make a move, yet.

They haven't said anything. Not even to each other.

“Hands against the wall,” Trent says when she is close enough, taking a large step to come up behind her.

She does as he orders, the rough, filthy cement sticking to her palms and fingers. She feels him standing there, behind her, too close for comfort. His height overshadows her tall frame, submerging her in his authority. She doesn't dare look back at him, but she could almost feel him smirking where he stands behind her, completely in control.

The other officer takes another step into the cell, before dragging the door to a close. She gasps at the sound, her hands unintentionally falling from their place on the wall when she turn towards the sound of the door closing, as if she could make it out before it shuts completely.

But Trent is quick to correct her. “Hands on the fucking wall,” he spits out, and shoves her back in place, forcing her hands back to where they had been.

She doesn't say anything. Her ragged breathing is the only thing that can be heard in here. And her face goes crimson red in anger for what she knows is coming.

Trent slowly starts to run his hands over her shoulders and down her arms, pressure soft and gentle, almost like he is caressing her.

She shivers at the feeling, but he just smiles wider.

His hands then, travels down the length of her back, before coming down and catching on the waistband of her trousers with curious fingers.

"Don't." the word escapes her clenched jaw before she knows it.

“Shh,” he says calmly, "Isn't it wonderful, inmate?" his cool voice suddenly breathes in her ear, lips brushing skin in tantalising snatches.

She suddenly jerks forward, intending to jump away. But, before she is able to do so, a strong hand to the back of her neck pulls and pushes her back into the wall, covering her mouth with the other free hand.

"Shh, shh ..."

Addison tries to twist away, but the hold on her remains strong and the grasp isn't loosened in the slightest bit.

"Aaahhh ..." Trent then purrs, "Have you finally given up?" he croons near her ear before he chuckles.

"L-Let go of me!" she says, words muffled by his hand.

"I don't think you are in any position to talk to me like that."

Trent is the first to pull away, breathing softly upon her. "Such a scared little girl." he whispers as he leans in and nuzzles her neck.

"Stop that." she shakes slightly and instinctively arches up into the officer's deceivingly gentle touch.

"I don't think I will." his voice reverberates on her neck, almost echoing from within her.

She tries to move away from him, but one free hand snakes around her waist and pulls her towards him.

"Why do you keep trying to run?"

"I want to get away before you do anything."

"But where can you possibly run to?"

And he's right.

Trent then presses her close to him, running his hand up her shirt and drawing circles on her stomach.

"Stop it. Stop it."

She hates this. She hates feeling so helpless because she knows she's at their mercy and she has to do whatever they say because they hold all the power here.

He crouches down and circles the length of her legs, pressing down on her thighs and groping the area around her butt.

She wants to throw up, bile even rises up.

"Hmm ... Addison …" The demon's lips once again are brushing against her earlobe. "You foolish girl ... how can you possibly hope to control anything in your life if you just run away from it all."

Addison finds herself shaking, at his words, truthful yet in a very hurtful way that would indeed come from the mouth of the devil - calling him human is just wrong.

She has always been afraid, and has wanted to run away from everything and anything. She was sheltered, yes, but she had always wanted to stand up and face whatever life had thrown at her. But this was not what she had in mind.

"Stop. Please." she utters finally.

She sighs deeply, her eyes somewhat watering.

"I'm not going to hurt you. Not in the way you're thinking."

She glares at him, her eyes glassy and unpolished.

"I don't believe you."

"It makes no difference to me."

She grits her teeth, feeling coming back to her form. "What does that mean?"

He then leans over and lets his tongue trail over her neck, awakening the parts of her soul that had been asleep.

"You taste wonderful."

She shudders at his voice, but she isn't able to move away even if she wanted to.

"I would like you to let me go."

"You are much too pretty for me to do that."

She wants to run, but she is rooted to the spot, where she just can't stand from. She wants to run away, from him, from everything, from this prison, but nothing seems to be working. Nothing ever did for her. It is like she is in slow motion and everything else is happening so fast, too quickly for her to even catch up.

"Your hair is so lovely. It's like blood, almost."

"Blood?"

That's a first.

"Has no one told you that before?"

"Of course not."

"They should have. I thought you would enjoy a compliment."

"Well … I don't."

He begins to play with her hair, almost lulling her into his grasp, but completely freezing her up when she felt one of his hands being guided downwards, from her chest, onto her stomach, and near deep south. His other hand then travels down to her chest and roughly grabbing one of her breasts, his thumb grazing over up and down.

She fights against panting breaths to answer the devil, unwittingly still arching up into the his caresses.

"Please stop …"

Flushed skin.

A pant, a ragged pant broke free.

"Stop ..."

The devil is outright panting against her neck now, the animalistic, deprived grunting too loud for the small, quiet room.

Addison is very well aware of what's happening, of what he's doing to her. She's all too stunned to move; too stunned to make a sound, to even breathe.

It's too hot in here, hot enough to scald and she's screaming, or she thinks she is, closing her eyes until it seems that she is lost in a mist.

The devil has his arm around her waist now, trying to push her into an angle just right, the other on her breast as he works up a crude and urgent rhythm, thrusting his still-clothed pelvis against her still-clothed ass, all the while she remains statue still.

All Addison could think of is how this ... whatever was happening looked so much like what she had witnessed at her neighbours' as an eight year old.

It's still engraved up in there, fresh as ever after all these years.

Even now, she still doesn't know why she peeked over the fence but - _curiosity killed the cat, right?_

Perhaps she supposes it was because she had been begging her parents to get her a dog for her birthday for the longest time and Mrs. Brighton had said she was always welcome to play with her dogs. And that was when she saw dogs fucking for the first time.

At eight, she just thought they were playing. _You know ... normally._ She doesn't think she even knew what sex was at that time, let alone, what they were doing. She didn't know exactly what she was watching but she knew it was something she should be witnessing.

She remembers how the female dog just seemed to be putting up with it, but the male was loving it. Really pounding into her like he'd get more puppies on her. And that reminds her of her current situation - of dogs fucking and she's that bitch.

If she wasn't pregnant she'd have kicked him, try shoving him off at the very least, even if it'd kill her in the process. Now, she has more than herself to think about. Trying to fight this giant devil would only risk the foetus unnecessarily.

She splays her arms against the wall, fingers curved into the wall, nails clawing at the dirt as she tries to steady them both or hold on or stop herself from falling because the devil himself can't seem to hold himself up anymore.

For a long time after the devil finished, Addison just simply stands there, unmoving, still shellshocked and uncomprehending for what had just happened. She's keenly aware that there's a dampness in the back of her uniform.

“She’s clean,” he rasps at the shell of her ear, making her recoil at the sound and she harshly pulls herself away from him when he finally lets go.

* * *

> _**June 29th,** _

She eats breakfast alone, of course. It's one thing she doesn't mind about being locked up here. Mealtimes in the general prison were always a tense affair. Hundreds of bored and miserable women eating bad food in close proximity is a riot only waiting for a spark. Meals were eaten quickly, with one eye on the activity around you. Here she could at least try to eat her bad food in peace.

Her thoughts briefly go to life on the outside, to Derek, her friends, and what they're doing. Whether they're still at the campus or at rotations. With an effort she wrenches her thoughts away; she hasn't seen Derek in weeks, she misses him.

She is able to get up and walk a bit more today, so she paces the confines of her cell, it's not more than four or five paces from one end to the other, even with the lurching, unbalanced strides she has. She runs her hands along the walls just for something different to do; peers at the sink and toilet for about the twentieth time.

Yesterday's events did not happen. _Nope_. Because it's a lot easier to just forget it ever happened than having to see Trent every time she closes her eyes. It's what she has to do in order to survive this place.

She can't run.

After she gets tired of pacing, she sits back on the bed. Then, she lies down and clutches her thigh. Wonders how long it is until lunch. She looks at the painted over window, at the wall, at the door.

Just as she think she'll get up and pace for a bit more there are heavy footsteps and her name is called, along with the usual order to 'cuff up'. She's getting better at the procedure by now, though she still hates having her hands confined. Her wrists are a colourful rainbow of purples and yellows.

She is soon being moved along the corridor with the usual leg chains on. The officers, Martinez and Anderson this time, has informed her that she is going to exercise and she feels a brief ray of hope. It's now been four days since she's seen even a glimpse of the sky, let alone sun, and she's eager to feel the fresh air in her lungs and to see the outside world.

'Exercise' turns out to be a fenced in run, a bit like a dog run, about fifty feet long, there's a covering over the top of the run and heavy wire mesh on either side, so her view is fairly limited but at least it's outside. There's no equipment of any sort, so 'exercise' consists of pacing up and down the ground instead of back and forth in her cell but hey, it's a change.

There's a run either side of her, a couple of feet away from her with a prisoner in each one. She doesn't recognise the women, and they're both black so prison culture means she's expected to have little or nothing, to do with them. It's not like they can have a conversation anyway so she leaves it alone. They look at her, but then turn away, being no more excited to see her than she is to see them.

And that's about as exciting as it gets. By the end of the hour, she's bored of her little pen and can't walk any further but she still doesn't want to go back inside when they come back for her. The guards aren't interested in her suggestion that they install a heated pool and a Jacuzzi and instead load her back up with the cuffs and leg chains and march her back to her cell.

Once she's alone again she realises there's a small pile of stuff on her bed. Further investigation reveals a pad of writing paper, a pen, and two cheap paperback books - both thrillers with a dashing hero holding a gun on the front cover. Cool, not the books she likes to read but still, books. She's so happy to see them that she's annoyed at herself for that happiness.

_Has she really fallen so low that a couple of books are all that is needed to make her happy?_

She thinks of those rabbits in their cages, excited when they uncover a stray pellet hiding in their bedding. She wonders if she should ring Savvy up when she gets out and tell her she's discovered the real secret to being happy - take everything away from someone and then give them back one little thing at a time. She figures that Savvy wouldn't be impressed by that insight, or by her.

There's some shouting outside in the corridor and she limps over to the door, peering out of a small crack where the cuff port doesn't quite shut properly. She can't see much, but she gets an impression of officers in heavy gear, dragging someone between them. There's cursing and screaming and all the other inmates of the tier start yelling until there's a wordless, angry, cacophony of sound. Addison thinks it sounds much like feeding time at the zoo.

Retreating from the door, she picks up one of the books and lies back on the bunk with it, trying to ignore the sounds all around her.

It's got nothing to do with her.

* * *

> **_June 30th,_ **

When they take her for her shower, she's thankful that she's finally able to change her clothes and wash all traces of Trent on her skin. It's been two days since he paid her a visit, so two days of wearing the same clothes.

She'd cleaned off the dried blood from the fight that got her here as best as she could in the sink in her cell with a bird bath.

In SHU, there can only one inmate at a time in the showers - of course, for safety reasons, so at least there’s that. But the catch is that, because there's always a catch, she'd have to be handcuffed to a cage.

Yes, a cage is what she has to call it, an 8x3 feet cage.

They had handed a 'clean' towel from a bin, and a new set of clothes and undergarments from yet another male officer. Thankfully, he left it at handing things out, and didn’t come with her to the showers.

It is just her, and CO Jones.

Jones releases her hands and tells her to strip by the bench opposite the showers and then he'll cuff a wrist to the cage where she'll have her shower. He's standing just a few feet away with his arms crossed menacingly over his chest. He looks like he is in no mood to argue, but it isn't as intimidating as Trent. She has to try.

“Are you going to be watching me the entire time?” she asks.

Showering with an audience and handcuffed, though only one wrist, is torment and degrading enough.

“Yep,” he says, not moving a muscle.

If she's going to shower, she's going to have to do it quick.

Quick and painless like ripping off a bandaid.

She keeps her back turned, wrapping herself as much as she can in the coarse towel, she walked up to one of the cages, and he handcuffs one of her wrist to the shower cage. There isn't any curtains, nothing to shield her from view.

“Could you turn around at least?”

The officer sighs defeatedly, and turns to his side ever so slightly so he can only see her out of his peripheral vision.

This has to be the most humiliating experience ever.

She hangs the towel on the side of the stall, covering her chest with her arms as much as she could. There's a hard piece of prison soap, five minutes max in the shower with an officer watching her from the doorway and the water is almost lukewarm at best - almost, it's still freezing, though. Still it feels good to be able wash away the stink of the past week days.

_(She's been smelling like bile since she got here.)_

But that is when everything comes up.

She falls to her knees but the cuff keeps her mostly upright just as the first hurl works its way up her throat and spewing its contents all over the drain. The mush of whatever she had been eating gets stuck in the cracks, before the water disintegrates it enough to let it pass. Her stomach contracts again, spitting out more bile, until nothing more comes out, leaving her to dry heave till her oesophagus relaxes.

_Breathe in, breathe out._

She focuses on the splash of water showering over her skin, feeling the tracks left as they slither down.

_Okay, so, what's one more experience to scar her for life?_

When the water stops, the CO uncuffs her from the cage so she can get out.

Careful as to not slip on the slippery tiles, she walks back to the bench to begin dressing in the new and fresh clothes waiting there. The relief of having clean clothes to wear cannot be denied even if she tried. She feels less like a bum on the streets now.

She's escorted back to her cell in silence and as she waits for the door to open, she spends the last few seconds of relative freedom trying to take in everything of the outside world that she can, even if that world consists of only a grim concrete floor, and painted white walls.

Back in her cell she lies on the bunk, stares at the walls and waits until dinner.

* * *

> **_July 2nd,_ **

Lunch is delivered, or rather, shoved, through a slot in the bottom of her cell door. The tray clangs as it scrapes along the ground and the food slops in its little compartments. There is something particularly demeaning about having her food like this, the resemblance to feeding time at the zoo can't be forgotten.

She stares at it listlessly for a while but then gets up, picks it up of the floor and takes it back to her bunk. There's a mound of something that might be scrambled eggs, a piece of cold toast, a spoonful of baked beans, and a hash brown. All soft foods, able to be eaten with the plastic spork provided, or her fingers, which is all she's allowed. The whole meal looks congealed, unappetising. It's all there's going to be until dinner time though so she tries to eat it slowly, keeping a wary eye out for any foreign objects that might have made their way into her food - she's met some of the women who works in the kitchens and they're friends with Cortez _(the girl she beat up to get herself here)_.

She tries not to think about breakfast with Derek, or the macadamia nut pancakes he made during that time she crashed in his apartment, or the times they'd grabbed some food together in the morning, before class.

She tries not to think about eating with Derek, or about stealing food off his plate, or about beer and pizza on a Saturday night.

She tries not to think about Derek at all.

When she closes her eyes she can see herself driving towards his apartment. He waves at her; he's happy to see her.

She leaves her breakfast half eaten, stashes the hash brown away until later, and then puts the tray back through the slot in the bottom of the door. She's been informed that she's allowed twenty minutes for each meal, then the tray must be returned, spork intact and on the tray. Nothing else is allowed out the slot, and not returning the tray in a timely manner is apparently a disciplinary offence. She's not sure what they would do to her for breaking the rules while she's in here, but she's decided it's not worth finding out.

They come back a little while later while she's throwing up in the toilet to collect the tray and that's the brief excitement of lunch. Now there are a few hours before the procedure is repeated for dinner.

Her life now is measured by the delivery of meals.

_How very exciting!_


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disturbing-ish dream ahead.

**Out of Sight, Out of Mind**

_**Chapter Nine** _

_"What do the animals do in the zoo?"_

* * *

> _**July 3rd,** _

Time passes and her first week in SHU bleeds into her second and Addison is feeling both better and worse for it.

Better because she's made it a week without much incident and it's seven days done out of the standard month long sentence; she still hasn't been told how long she'd be in here, so she's not sure. Worse since she's now somehow experiencing the harsher symptoms of pregnancy, and they are extreme when she does. Sickness lasts for hours. Most days she only loses one meal, but some are two or even three. And fatigue has her confined to her bed for days at a time.

*** * ***

It's the second Friday of her stay in solitary, and the start of her second week here. Friday nights used to mean the weekends. It used to be fun and carefree.

When she was in college, it meant two days and nights of partying, of drinking and some casual sex. Crowds of people around her, voices raised in fun, not in anger, intimidation or fear. The last few years Friday nights have mostly meant a weekend of sleeping in with Derek, of brunches and lazy Sundays. And sometimes a girls night out with the girls.

Now, she's more alone than she's ever been before. There are thousands of women around her but her world is this cell, no bigger than a bathroom. There are no other people in her life now; there is nobody to talk to. She sees people only during her one hour of exercise, her every-Friday-and-Tuesday shower and the brief moments when she is given food, and the people she sees keep their interactions as impersonal as possible. Even the psychiatrist, who'd come once a week to ask if they're contemplating suicide.

In the rest of the prison some of the guards are friendly with the inmates, they are happy to engage in conversation, to talk about sports, and family, or just to pass a few comments. There’s a sense that the guards don’t want to be there any more than the inmates do.

In solitary, it's different, even the guards who were friendly to her in gen pop look through her now, their faces blank. She exists only as a source of trouble to them, someone they have to control, someone who can turn on them, and injure them. They watch her the way a snake handler watches a dangerous snake. To get too close is to be bitten. She's sure that it’s something they’ve learned from experience, given the nature of some of the women they’ve had to deal with in here, but she never thought she’d miss passing a couple of words with Karev or Winston or some of the other friendlier guards.

Now this sudden all-encompassing silence is very hard to take.

She gets off the bunk _(her back is aching from the lousy excuse of a mattress and constantly being hunched over the toilet)_ restlessly walks down the narrow space between the bunk and wall, turns around when she gets to the far wall and walks back. She then turns around at the door and limps back along the space. She decides to count how many laps she can do before she either gets bored of doing it or dizzyingly nauseated.

She needs a distraction.

When the count is over one hundred, she loses track and decides that next time she will use a pen and paper to keep count. She sits back on the bunk, mouth twisting as she taps a finger against her swelling abdomen _(it looks more bloated than pregnant, really)_ and she closes her eyes against the insistent thrumming of her stomach. They don't give her any medication for her nausea for some reason, all she can do is lie here and wait for it to lessen.

She takes a few deep breaths, pushing herself to stand. She probably shouldn't have overworked herself with all the pacing back and forth.

Once she thinks it'd be the last of her hurling for now, she flushes the toilet, bends down to drink from the tap and rinse her mouth and face.

So ... she really truly is pregnant. Sometimes it's still hard to wrap her mind around that fact. It's terrifying to think in just six short months, she'd become a mother to a tiny little human.

She'd hold _him_. She'd count _her_ little fingers and toes.

It's only a matter of time before she'd be attached to the cluster of cells growing inside of her.

Maybe she already is.

God, she would swell, and get bigger, and have to find a way to keep herself from doing damage to this poor thing she didn’t even want and now have to keep alive.

For the first time in a long time, Addison wants a cigarette.

 _Badly_.

“I’m going to be a terrible mother.” she says it out loud, as if to test the flavour. It tastes right, sits exactly so on the tip of her tongue. She rests her palm over her belly again.

_God, would she even be able to move when it neared full size? Would like she waddle?_

She've always thought those women who waddled looked ridiculous.

“You deserve better than me,” she says to her mostly-flat stomach, “but I guess this is what you get. Lucky you.”

She feels ridiculous. She isn't even sure it has ears yet, or any sort of features. She'd never had to think about it before. She is woefully underprepared for pregnancy, and more than a bit resentful of the fact that this doesn't come natural to her.

But she loves kids, would like to have one once she's settled - financially and mentally - which isn't now, at twenty-four and incarcerated and with absolutely zero say in anything.

The women said she'd come back to prison baby-less and empty.

_Don't listen to Linda, Connecticut._

_Is it true?_

She doesn't want to think about that. She doesn't want to think about anything to do with that at all, she just wants this to be done, for Derek and her to live with this and come what may.

And she still has six months to go.

* * *

> **_July 4th,_ **

When they come for her she thinks it must be for a shower, or exercise, although it's not time for either of those.

Shower was supposed to be yesterday but she's learnt that in prison there is a routine, but the routine is often disrupted when staffing schedules or other concerns interrupt. If there will be insufficient officers to take her for a shower tomorrow she will go today, at _their_ convenience. If they don't have time to take her for exercise, then they won't. The 'rights' of a prisoner are very tenuous indeed.

She only suspects that this is for a different reason when they enter an elevator. The guards tells her to face the wall and she does so. They leave their hands on her cuffed arms the whole time. As the elevator descends, her heart rate quickens, she's helpless; they could do anything they want with her. Like Trent did. There's silence in the elevator and she knows their entire focus is on her. She's relieved when the elevator stops and she's led along another blank, white walled corridor.

She is taken to a small room, and then cuffed to a chair in the empty room, the leg shackles are left on. A plastic barrier separates one half of the table from the other. The guards check her bonds and then retreat, ignoring her question as to why she is here.

She relaxes slightly once the guards leave. Obviously she is here for a visit of some sort. She dares to hope, just for one moment, that it might be Derek. Even a finger waggling lecture from Bizzy would be welcome now.

When the door opens and a stranger enters, she sighs silently, this guy is a lawyer; he might as well have it stamped on his forehead for how obvious it is. The guy is young, and a little nervous, his eyes flick to the cuffs on Addison's wrist.

Once reassured that Addison can't so much as scratch her nose if she wants to, let alone jump over the table and assault him, the lawyer sits down and launches straight into business.

There's a litany of charges they want to press against her, alongside her possession of drugs with intent to distribute, which are aggravated assault, and _incitement to riot_.

"Incitement to riot?"

"Your hubbub was the fuel to the fire."

"But how's that on me?"

"Incitement," he clarifies.

"I know what incitement means. "

 _Fuck_.

She is so fucked. She lightly bangs her head against the cool surface of the metal table. She's starting to feel sick again.

The lawyer tells her she can go to court and fight the charges, possibly ending up with another three years jail time, if not more, or plead out and get eight months.

He's only here to get his 'client's' consent to the plea. He presents it as if it's an easy decision, _what's another eight months in prison after all?_

Everything, when you're pregnant.

Addison sits across from him, slumped in her chair, wearing her bright orange jumpsuit, designed to mark her out as one of the 'worst of the worst', deserving of being locked away from most forms of human contact for some unspecified period of time. For a moment she stares at the lawyer, after eight days in almost total isolation, this sudden burst of activity and conversation is almost surreal.

"I defended myself. I was just standing up for myself. She threatened me. She wanted my cookie."

The lawyer shakes his head, putting his hands up, "Okay. Okay. Let me stop you right there. I do not want to know what that really means."

"What? What the hell are you talking about?"

"Cookie? Your -"

"Nooo! You're disgusting. I meant a literal cookie. She wanted to get my cookie."

"And was it worth it?"

"It’s not about the cookie. It’s to let them know that I’m not a pushover." she tries to explain. Tries to not make it sound of ridiculous because it sure as hell fucking is.

She's in SHU over a cookie.

"Look, Addison -"

"Call me Montgomery."

The lawyer sighs and glances at his watch but complies, "Look, Montgomery, you seem like a nice, reasonable person who's gotten caught in the realm prison politics, but at the end of the day, you still broke the rules. You assaulted a fellow inmate and now she's needing reconstructive surgery. These people don't care that you stood up for yourself, all they care about is that you disrupted the prison and defied direct orders. Sure, you could go to court and fight the charges, point out to a jury that you stood up for yourself over a _cookie_. The jury doesn't care about you, you're in prison already, you must be scum. Do you have any idea how jury trials work in the case of someone charged with additional crimes while in prison? The acquittal rate is extremely low."

"But not zero."

"No, it's not zero, but it’s damn close to it. Do you want to take the chance of serving another three years or more when you could get by with eight months?"

The lawyer shuffles some papers, "There's also one other thing you should know, they have a case against your cellmate, one Ms. Calliope Torres. They strongly implied that if you take the deal they won't proceed any further with it. From what I've seen she could be charged with a litany charges - from assaults to possession of drugs and possession with intent to distribute, unlawful detention of a prison staff. The amount of drugs they found in her cell," he scoffs, "she'd be here for another twenty-five. And since it's your cell too ... it is in my recommendation that you take the plea deal."

"I'm pregnant." Addison says firmly. Somehow hoping that that piece of information would change something.

It's doesn't.

"All the more reason for you to take the deal." he says, "For you and your unborn child." The young lawyer shrugs, glancing at his watch again, Addison figures he has somewhere else to go, too bad, Addison doesn't.

"So, I take this deal, they lay off Torres and I get another eight months in XXX Correctional Facility. Great.” she thinks it over and shrugs, “Fine, I'll sell my soul – why the hell not?"

She came here fully prepared for anything, no reason to let go of that agenda now. She might not feel guilty of these additional charges but nothing can change what she did to Cortez. _Nothing_. Eight more months will mean nothing in the long run.

The lawyer smiles, relieved that his client isn't proving difficult and he can get on with his life. "Okay, you'll go before a judge, probably in a week or two, make your plea and that's that."

It isn't until her lawyer is pushing away from the table that Addison remembers the really important issue.

"When do I get out of solitary?" she asks, "Not that I'm not enjoying getting away from psycho bitches and Nazi gangs wanting me to join them," she says, trying not to sound pathetically desperate. Eight days, that's all she's done and she's begging to be sent back to gen pop, as if it were some sort of nirvana.

The lawyer shrugs, he doesn't even pause in the act of gathering all his important papers together. "That's an administrative matter, not a legal one. Solely up to the warden. You get out when they say you get out. A month at least, usually."

He buzzes to be let out and he's gone, another case neatly disposed of, another eight months of her life wiped away.

Addison is taken back to her cell and when the door slams shut and the cuffs are removed, she slumps down on the floor, back against the door, staring at walls she's already memorised.

* * *

> _**July 5th,** _

Addison's in solitary nine days in, and like everyday, it’s just her and her thoughts _(but today is new because yesterday she was told that she'd be in here for eight more months; forty-four months altogether - her baby would be almost two if she'd be able to get out doing half as planned for good behaviour)_ and they bring her lunch on a brown plastic tray like in elementary school.

She is ravenous.

On the tray is a slice of what she assumes is turkey, covered in thick _(probably originally powdered)_ gravy, a large scoop of _(probably also powdered)_ mashed potatoes, and a wobbling column of red jello, wiggling in a small, tan plastic bowl.

She is starving.

Her spork is almost in her mouth when it hits her with the weight of a cement truck.

Her stomach churns; nausea hits.

She can’t eat it.

Here is how she rationalise it - meat is meat is meat and she will be sick; gravy is easy to make from any meat that drips and she will be sick; when she was little Bizzy always made mashed potatoes and she will be sick; gelatin is just bone and she will be sick.

The setting before her, though sparse and underwhelming, is still food and her mouth practically waters with it.

At first hunger gnaws at her, biting into her stomach like little claws and her throat so dry it rattles with each breath. The baby is hungry. _Your baby is hungry._ She doesn't want to drink either, but reluctantly she swallows gulps of water which sit heavily and squirm like maggots twisting through her gut.

She comes back to her mind before she takes a single bite. She throws the spork to the floor, pushes the tray away.

She cannot eat but she should eat - for the baby - so she tries. Just a bite. And it ends up in the toilet.

She hurries a step to the toilet and is certain that the sounds of violent retching is filling the otherwise silent SHU corridor _(at this hour, it is)_.

Sometimes it feels like her body is trying to puke her guts out. She'd cry and shake because it's one thing to vomit once in six years, it's a whole other issue vomiting six times a day.

She knows it's because of the changes in her body, the high levels of hormones in her blood. Nausea and vomiting usually go away after the first trimester, and God, she hopes that it's the case for her.

* * *

> **_July 6th,_ **

Some of the staff starts bringing her food - out of pity, mostly, because she can't seem to keep anything down but she appreciates them trying to help her with what helped their wife - even though they are not supposed to.

Fruits first, bruised apples and blood red oranges and soft squishy peaches that she gobbled down and then vomits back up. They start bringing her things in packages then, mass produced and so artificial they can hardly be considered food. She gorges herself on crackers and pop tarts and crumbled oreos but even those don’t stay in her stomach for more than a few minutes.

They keep bringing her meals on plastic trays.

She keeps trying.

She cannot eat.

And now that she hasn't properly eaten for entire week and a half, and loses weight quickly, they make her see the prison psychiatrist.

She still doesn't eat.

The first few sessions, the doctor asks her questions. She doesn't answer anything but that she needs a physician and not a psychiatrist.

He offers her food, not the tasteless prison mush or the food the guards sneak up to her _(which he tells her he knows about)_ , but actual food like eggs and bacon and perfectly prepared sandwiches. It’s tempting _(she's tempted)_ but she doesn't say anything else because she's been trying to eat and they haven't listened to her at all.

It's not psychiatric, it physical. She's not purposefully starving herself, she simply cannot keep food down. Or anything for that matter.

She tells him it's severe morning sickness. But he doesn't listen.

"My mother had it, too."

"I'm the one with a medical degree here. Not you."

The psychiatrist is bland and unassuming and she sits across from him in her green jumpsuit, handcuffed and try not to sweat under his gaze. He does paperwork and she cradles her aching gut with her trembling arms. He warns her that eventually the prison is going to start treating this like a hunger strike and shove food down her throat.

"Our duty is to keep prisoners alive. A dead inmate, let alone a pregnant one would not be good for our image."

"I'm not doing this on purpose." she tells him at one of their sessions.

He looks at her and it's clear that he doesn't believe her.

"I know what you want. You want to get out of here. That is not happening." he says to her, one day as he is sitting and filling out paperwork, with a beautifully plated chicken breast sitting before her. It feels like he is teasing, goading her, and the smell alone makes her gag. “I understand why you don’t want to talk.”

_No, you don't. You don't listen._

They take her back and she slowly lowers her head, until it thunks against the cold cement of the bed frame sticking out of the wall. She takes deep breaths after deep breaths and sits with her head between her knees. Her stomach rolling, her throat clenching on the taste of bile on her tongue. She wishes everything can go back to perfectly normal in the blink of an eye.

But the worst part is, her stomach wouldn't hurt as long as there is literally nothing in it. For the last twenty-four hours she hasn’t even been able to keep down water. And once she’s done getting rid of it all, she’s right as rain.

So, she didn't even try to eat today.

* * *

> **_July 7th,_ **

There's a cell extraction on her row today.

Addison is dozing on her bed mid-afternoon when she hears the heavy footsteps of a group of guards and then their voices as they stop a few cells away from her.

They bark out instructions to the inmate, telling her to cuff up and then lie on her bunk, hands behind her back. Addison can’t hear what the inmate say back, but the guards repeat the instructions a couple of times and then she hears a spraying sound, and one of the guards calls out ‘mace’.

There’s another spray, and then she hears someone coughing and the door of a cell opening. There's more shouting and Addison limps to the door of her cell, trying to see out the very small gaps around the cuff port and the food port. She can't see anything much but she hears the group walk along the row, away from her, there’s more coughing and a voice rising in protest, and the guards telling someone to shut up.

There's noise coming from the other cells around her now, women yelling, cursing, screaming, women banging on their doors and walls until there's a wordless, angry, cacophony of sound. Addison thinks it sounds much like feeding time at the zoo.

Addison finds herself pounding on her door, making a noise, yelling something, adding to the chaos.

When she realises what she's doing, she stops, shocked - _when did she become like these women?_ She goes back to her bed, sits up against the cold wall at the end of the bed and stares at the door, hoping the guards don’t come back. After a while the noise of the other inmates fades away and it’s quiet on the row again.

* * *

> **_July 8th,_ **

So, it seems the initial morning sickness back at gen pop was just a precursor to the real pains and troubles she would have endure as a life grow within her.

It becomes clear in the weeks that had passed as the vomiting and nauseas grow more intense that Addison has hyperemesis gravidarum, a possibly life-threatening condition that makes it nearly impossible for her to keep food down.

Bizzy had it and her grandmother, too.

"It happens to all Forbes women, dear. It's a curse."

Her already lean body loses what little fat it has to spare quickly as frequent regurgitation keeps her from retaining, let alone adding the pounds she needs for a healthy pregnancy.

*** * ***

It’s a Wednesday when the warden decides enough is enough. They come to collect her from her cell, she resists the best she can, but they effortlessly take her to a room anyway, and strap her to a chair. She is stuck tight to the metal chair, bound with thick padded cuffs and a strap around her waist and chest.

"What are you doing?"

She's so tired. So sore. She threw up twice the night before and now they are shoving food into her mouth, grabbing her by the chin, jaw and then, holding their hands over her mouth while she chokes and struggles and chew. There are fingers squeezing her nose close like a vice; she thrashes as she struggles to breathe and is forced to swallow and swallow and swallow.

They just laugh. They cover her eyes, her mouth, and she swears to herself she wouldn’t scream, she could at least do that even though she could do nothing else.

Breath hitching in her chest, there is a mountain sitting on her chest that shouldn’t be there and she cannot breathe, but they continue shoving food anyway.

They step back, watch her as she lolls in the chair, food falling from her chin, feeling weak and feverish and oh so sick to her stomach.

She is a boat, trapped alone on an ocean, and the tide has just picked up. Her cheeks are flushed red with shame, and anger. She doesn't understand why they're doing this to her.

This isn't a solution.

It's then that she spews up all over herself and the guards and the nurses. Her throat burns, her abdominal muscles are in knots, and there is a sheen of sweat on your brows and staining her jumpsuit with its moisture.

Her wrists aches under the cuff's firm grip and she's certain that there will be bruises in the shape of fingers all across her jaw tomorrow.

Tears comes to her against her will. It just hurts so much, though. So humiliating. Everything hurts and she's a mess. Literally. She swallows hard again and again, tries her best to stop what she knows will happen when another wave of nausea hits.

This time, tears runs down her face, hot and wet as she looks resentfully at the psychiatrist and at the mess all over her person. "This is ridiculous, you know that? All you have to do is give me a pill for the nausea like I've been begging all of you."

* * *

> **_July 9th,_ **

It's raining today; she can hear it splashing against the window of her cell although she can't see it. She wonders if she will still be taken to exercise, she hopes so, exercise isn't much really, but in here it's everything.

Her head is aching badly today; the vomiting always makes it worse. And not to mention the horrors of yesterday when they held her down, pried her mouth open and shoved food down her throat.

She've never been treated in that way before; it was terrifying.

Somewhere deep within her throat she feels a lump rising higher, wanting to escape her mouth and make her break into a violent sobbing, but Addison forces the lump down. It hurts, but she isn't going to cry. She can't afford to cry.

Already she can feel her vision beginning to blur. She bends over in agony, coughing up air, feeling like her lungs were going to burst, but still nothing comes up. The gagging feels awful, but somehow it eases her pain a little. After a while of spitting and wheezing, she wipes her mouth with her ragged sleeve and raises her head.

She props herself up on a pillow and swallows hard, it will be a couple of hours before they strap her to a chair again.

"I want to go back home." she says to the wall in front of her.

The rain is still falling as she struggles to her feet and begins to pace. Three paces, that's all she can do before she's feeling dizzy.

"I want to go back home."

She'll probably refuse exercise today. But maybe she could just go out and sit. That way she could still get some sunshine and fresh air.

"I want to go back home."

She tries to get up. She can't. And without thinking she slams her hand against the solid weight of the cement, then again, and again. It hurts, so she does it again, over and over. The walls shivers under her hand. It feels so good. Her palm stings, and turns red. She flexes the fingers, feels delicious pain in each one. Curls her right hand into a fist and throws her head back.

"I want to go back home."

Yes. She is fucking drained.

"I want to go back home."

When they come to take her to see the psychiatrist again for a feeding, she's sitting on her bed, flexing her fingers to keep the pain going.

*** * ***

Longing eyes watches the door in a silent prayer for it to be open again. To reveal salvation. To reveal anything. Anything but the dub grey or spotted metallic showering the room. At least there is the bright, sharp contrast of the door.

The red paint has flaked all over. Scratched. Flawed. The top is kept bright red, fading as it goes down to the bottom where the underlying metal is bared, the upper part probably saved by its height. She can't reach it. She doubts many of the inmates could. Even if they did, they probably wouldn’t hold the strength to scratch at the paint at that height.

There are inscriptions. Calls for help etched in the coating.

_Help. Save me. Kill me._

_How long would it take for her mind to start spurring out ideas on how to save herself? How to escape? A month? A week? A day perhaps?_

There’s no telling of just how dark her mind could get with so little. It’s like tapping on a broken window, or a cracked mirror, just waiting for the pieces to shatter apart.

_How hard would someone have to tap for her pieces to shatter? How long?_

Tap. Tap.

* * *

> **_July 10th,_ **

She had said yes, because any relief would be good, and if it got her out of her cell and to somewhere else, even if in shackles, it would be great.

The officers had looked less than interested and she'd sat out her 'exercise' hour shivering on the ground watching the inmates in the adjoining runs pace up and down. Afterwards they'd taken her back to her cell and that had seemed to be that.

She woke up in the morning feeling sick. Though not running a fever, her throat is sore, and her nose is running.

She goes to lie down again. She doesn’t hold out any hope that they will take her to the clinic unless she gets a lot worse.

On the verge of death, she suppose.

Addison wraps her blanket tighter around herself and closes her eyes. The best way to get through this is to sleep as much as possible, at least there is no pressure to work through it, now that she has nothing but ‘time off’.

_She's on the bus. Again. Derek is sitting next to her, his hand on her knee, that stupid, knowing smile on his face. She wishes he would just stop. Derek holds out a juicy burger to her._

_She's driving the bus. Derek is sitting next to her, urging her on. Amy is in front of them, standing in the street, her hands on her hips. Addison goes to brake and the bus starts to slow down, she's going to miss Amy. She turns to Derek and he grins and the bus speeds up. Amy screams. There’s blood, there’s so much blood._

_She's in a house, watching out the window. Mark is sitting next to her. Addison sees the bus speeding towards them. It's coming straight at them, she reaches out towards Mark, to push him out of the way but she can't quite get there, it's like she's moving through quicksand, she stretches out her hands again and she just barely grazes his fingertips with hers, and then the bus comes through the glass._

_She's on the bus, again. Derek is sitting next to him, a metal pole through his knee. If he lives he'll be damaged just like she is, she laughs at the irony._

_There are bars on the bus windows, and a lock on the door. She's trapped here. She turns to Derek and he's wearing a prison officer's uniform and more disturbing, he's holding a baby in his arms. Their baby? He takes a key out of his pocket and laughs as he tosses it out the bus window, along with the baby. Then he kisses her lightly on the cheek and whispers in her ear._

_"Welcome to hell, darling, you kinda deserve it."_

Her eyes snap open and the sight of her dreary prison cell greets her, she never thought she would be grateful to stare at the same four walls again, but it's better than being on that damn bus, and much better than having Derek with her like that.

She looks around cautiously; he's not here.

She wonders, just for a second, if a hallucination of Derek and their baby would be better than being in this cell by herself but she knows it wouldn’t be.

She rolls over on the bed, her throat dry and painful, and her mouth hanging open as she gulps in air. She feels miserable, and there's no relief in sight.


	10. Chapter 10

**Out of Sight, Out of Mind**

**_Chapter Ten_ **

_"No, that's alright. Don't help. I'm fine"_

* * *

> _**July 11th** _

It's the fifteenth day she has been in solitary. This is her third Saturday here. And if they're keeping her in solitary for thirty days _(and Aadams shouted out something about a month in solitary so, maybe)_ then she's halfway through. She doesn't want to spend another fifteen days in this cell, though.

She knows that many people do years in solitary, if not their whole sentence. When she was back in gen pop, she heard other prisoners talk about it, about their cellmates who were taken away and have never come back. She's seen it herself, the prison administration has the power to segregate anyone they want, for any reason they want. Mostly they say it’s to break up the gangs, but nobody ever did anything about Grey and her cronies or the Skinheads.

The other use of solitary was for punishment, for breaking the rules. Like she did herself by causing a fight to break out.

The standard sentence is thirty, that’s what she’s heard people say, ‘you’ll do thirty’, that’s what Callie had said. She's just doing the thirty; they won’t keep her here for the rest of her sentence. She's not part of a gang or in need of protective custody.

She's smart, and she's used to being alone, this shouldn't be so hard. She should be able to do this easily. She should like this better than being out there in gen pop, sharing a block with eighty other psychotic women, except her roomie who had helped her in more ways than one.

She wonders what happened to Callie, and whether she was still in this prison. Last she saw her, she was being pinned down by an officer.

She misses playing chess with Callie, she wasn't that much of a challenge but it was something to do, something to keep her mind active, and she was the one who steered her through her first rocky days in prison, while she got used to the system.

Everyone on the outside will be disappointed in her; that she'd ended up here plus eight months. Addison had wanted to be be good, to keep her head down and keep out of trouble, but it's a lot harder to do just that. They don't know what it's like, so they shouldn't really have a say.

She wonders what will happen when she gets out of solitary, if she gets out of solitary. Some low life, will have stolen all her stuff, and she will have to start all over again. She'll have a new cell, a new roomie, and whatever is left of the Cortez's crew will be out for her ass. She might even have to go into protective custody if things are too hot for her out there. That won’t be much better than solitary.

Yeah, she should be glad of her cushy little stay here. No-one can get to her, she is safe from all that. Her food is chucked through the door three times a day, and all she has to do is sit in this little cell and stare at the walls.

_Simple._

She spends all day half hoping, against all odds, that maybe her solitary stay will only be fifteen days. Maybe she’ll get out early. It’s the longest day she’s had in here so far and when dinner goes down in the evening, she rolls over and puts a pencil mark on the piece of wall that is serving as her calendar.

Fifteen days done.

*** * ***

As a young girl, when she’d finally understood what consequences would follow for a young woman if they didn’t use condoms, Addison had found the idea of a living thing growing in a woman’s womb fascinating.

_And in truth, how was it not fascinating? How was it not miraculous?_

A human body growing and sustaining and keeping alive another living thing.

It was incredible.

But she’d never thought about it in regards to herself. Well, not exactly never; she did want children, though, she never thought it'd be this soon. And besides it wasn't as though they had been dating for that long and they both were dreaming on becoming doctors, so the prosperity of having kids was never in their topics of conversation.

Now, when it is herself, pregnant, it is as miraculous as it is terrifying; like a parasite eating away at her nutrients and stealing them from her blood. Some nights, she wakes in a panic, hands to her stomach, remembering the dream and waking to a nightmare.

Addison had managed a 'hi, baby,' once, back in gen pop, when she first found out, and immediately felt moronic.

Now, at night, when the world is screaming, she would curl into her side, place her hand over her stomach, and begin to whisper. Sometimes French, sometimes English. Sometimes poetry.

* * *

> _**July 13th,** _

The first thing on Monday, she is startled by a bang on the door and the command to get to the cuff port. She stares at the door in confusion for a moment, this isn't the usual procedure, _are they taking her out of here?_ She dares to hope and after another impatient shouted command, she gets herself into the orange coverall they tossed in and goes over to the cuff port, turns around and puts her hands back through it.

She's limping today. Her knee still hurts.

She feels the usual bite of the metal on her wrists and then goes and stands towards the back of her cell as ordered while they open the door. They come in, pat her down and chain her ankles like normal. Like she isn't so weak she can hardly walk.

They're not in full riot gear so she figures it's not a cell extraction but she's still not sure what this is. Whatever's left of her stodgy breakfast sits uneasily on her stomach as they escort her out of the cell.

She's taken down the corridor to an elevator, where she's told to turn and face the wall. She does that, standing with her nose pressed against the corner like a naughty child while the guards keep a hold on her arms. Once, she thinks, she would have asked a lot of questions, demanded answers, now it seems more natural to hold her tongue and keep quiet.

They go out a door and she finds herself being put in the back of a van. She's the first one in the van, but she’s soon joined by three other prisoners. They're wearing the usual, marked out by their bright orange coverall.

The drive is long, and the windows in the back of a the van are blacked out, and there’s a solid partition to the front so she can’t see anything but at least it’s a trip away from solitary.

They give her a bag just in case she vomits.

She suspects she knows what this is all about and when she gets out of the van and sees that they are at the back entrance of a courthouse, her suspicions are confirmed. She's going to court so that they can add another charge and more months to her sentence.

 _Great_.

They're taken out of the van and herded down to some cells in the basement. She's done this before, she remembers when she was being arraigned. It's the same process.

Her ankles are still chained together and walking is difficult, she hopes that some officer with more brain cells than the others will realise she's limping and pregnant and take the chains off but instead they just walk slowly. The handcuffs and ankle chains are removed only once she's put into a cell.

She's in a cell by herself again, though she notes that the three women who'd come with her are in a cell together, she guesses that's because she's considered dangerous to other prisoners now.

She almost smiles at the thought.

At least this cell is the old fashioned type, with bars. The walls on each side are solid but she can see out of her cage and into the one across the way, and a little down the corridor. She doesn't know the other prisoners, and when they see her staring at them, they react with angry gestures so she looks away. She's still not sure where she'll stand in the prison when, or if, she gets out of solitary. She might have to ask to go into protective custody after all this. That would mean she'd end up being in what amounted to solitary for the rest of her prison stay, although she'd have slightly more 'privileges' than she does now.

It isn't long before they come for her, chain her up again, and take her up a set of stairs straight into the dock in a courtroom. The stairs are a struggle with both her hands and ankles chained and she can tell the guards are getting impatient with her slow progress.

_Well, too bad for them._

She doesn't want to fall.

She enters the dock still wearing the orange jumpsuit, so there'll be no doubt amongst the spectators in the court where she's come from. She's given a chair and she sits down thankfully _(she feels like she's five minutes from passing out)_ , hands still cuffed together and legs chained. A prison guard stands behind her in case she tries to make a run for it.

The charges are read and she stands to make her sole contribution to the proceedings, pleading 'guilty' to all charges as arranged. She sees a small smile on the face of her 'lawyer' seated at a table a little distance from her. No doubt he’s pleased that his client hasn't created trouble. The judge imposes an additional eight months sentence and she's quickly taken back to the cells.

She feels numb as she leans back against the cold wall of her cell. It's a surprise that she's able to not be sick this long. Another eight months, it's not like it's news to her, but it's still a blow.

"You look grey. What's wrong with you?"

She looks up and sees that the cell opposite now only has two occupants and one of them is talking to her, leaning up against the bars, arms hanging out.

She rubs her belly. It's strange, to hear someone talking to her again, and she feels off balance, unsure of herself. She stares at the woman for a moment.

“Stomach flu, I guess,” she lies, shrugging, "I don't know. They haven't send in a doctor."

The less people knows the better.

“Bastards. You should complain, you got rights man.”

Their conversation, such as it is, is interrupted by the guards returning to escort the woman up the stairs to whatever awaits her and Addison settles back in her cell, back against a wall, to wait. Concentrating on not vomiting even if her mouth is salivating.

_Eight more month. Okay. Okay. Okay._

Once all the prisoners have made the climb up the stairs and come back they're taken back to the van and they make the trip back to the prison. Addison is tired and in pain, and feeling numb about the additional eight months she’s just received. Nearly another year of prison.

When they arrive back and are unloaded from the van she hopes for one moment that they will take her with the other women, back to the general population section of the prison. Maybe they were just keeping her in solitary until the arraignment. Her hopes are dashed when she’s separated from the others and taken down the familiar corridor.

To her dismay they conduct another strip search, shredding any dignity she had left after this day, and then chain her up again and take her back to her cell.

As she takes the last few steps towards her cell, she stumbles, her legs collapsing underneath her. Agony shoots through her knee and she gasps. She notices the guards escorting her are immediately on high alert, their hands tightening on her arms. She struggles back to her feet, with the officers practically pulling her up, her breath comes in panting gasps.

She wants to rage at them, to tell them that she's no threat, and it's dangerous for a pregnant woman to be in a fucking belly chain and ankle shackles and of course, she has trouble walking, they smashed her knee in after all but the words catch in her throat. Instead she allows them to support her to her cell door and then goes placidly inside on command, just as she has every time before. Once she's uncuffed she staggers to the bed and sinks down onto it, grabbing her knee which is sending pains shooting through her body.

Eight months, another eight months, she keeps repeating to herself. She still has thirty-three left of her original sentence, so that's another forty-one in prison. Another forty-one months of totally inadequate basic human needs, of pregnancy needs, of lousy food and grinding boredom, another forty-one months of the world outside continuing on without her.

She sees her notes lying beside the bed. She picks up the notepad, reads what is written there and then suddenly tears the pages off the pad. Scrunching it into a ball she bounces it off the nearest wall. The other pages quickly follow until her bed is surrounded by little balls of paper.

*** * ***

It's a typical courtroom, grim and bland, a place without hope. Derek sits in the back and waits for Addison to appear.

There's a succession of prisoners, led up from the cells below straight into the dock. Both the judge and the lawyers appear bored, and the prisoners don't seem to care too much either. They stare around the courtroom, as if taking in any environment that's different from the tedium of their prison.

When Addison is brought up, Derek tenses. Seeing the woman he loves in leg chains and handcuffs and a bright orange jumpsuit hurts. Derek scrunches down in his seat and hides behind the big man in front of him. He doesn't want Addison to see him; he wants to grant her at least a little dignity.

Addison's case' barely takes five minutes, obviously all pre-arranged. She pleads guilty on cue, and then sits back down, her face creased and worn. She doesn't look good, her hair is much longer than normal and untamed, he's pretty sure she was limping, she's hunched over as it's obvious that she's lost weight.

She looks pale and old.

Once Addison is taken back down the stairs, to be locked up again, Derek quickly leaves the courtroom.

* * *

> _**July 15th,** _

It’s been nineteen days since she last ate without throwing it entirely back up, so they finally decided to send her to the hospital. In handcuffs and ankle shackles and a belly chain that connects it altogether of course, and she waddles carefully to the awaiting van with two officers by her side.

She walks slowly because she doesn't want to fall and her body is too weak to climb the stairs but the guards doesn't seem too bothered about it today; they don't drag her or push her or scream at her to hurry the fuck up like they normally do.

Her condition must be that terrible because they are actually helping her up the van.

Once they're there, they handcuff her to the bed and the nurse inserts an IV into her arm and it stings without any fat to shield her raw nerves. The IV provides her with fluids and nutrients that her body desperately needs and while it does not put any meat on her bones, it slightly eases the burn in her limbs and her belly.

At least the baby is finally getting something.

There is a prison officer seated in the hall 24/7 and a female one inside with her, pretending to give her privacy. The prison psychiatrist comes to see her a couple of hours after she's settled into her room. "The staff are surprised you’re so compliant with the IV."

They let her suck on ice chips. Her throat is almost moist. “I don’t want to die,” she says, and her voice is flat. It is _(probably)_ the first words she has spoken to him since they literally shoved food down her throat, but she isn't really keeping track.

“Oh no?”

He looks neutral, like she's been talking to him for weeks, and he raises an eyebrow in a very casual arch and the expression reminds her so much of Derek that for a second she thinks she might lose her ice chips all over the front of her hospital gown.

“Like I said to you and the guards, I'm not starving myself. It's serve morning sickness. I can't eat without throwing up.”

If only they'd listened to her weeks earlier.

She feels tired and worn down, but she can only focus on one thought. Despite the terrible soreness in her throat and a headache, she feels much more alert than the weeks prior.

*** * ***

The hospital staff brings her a bowl of broth and a jello cup; this time, it's green.

Her favourite.

Addison glances up at the doctor who's been talking to the female guard on her behalf. She doesn't like it when they do that - talk to a third person about her, as though she's not in the room.

"When will she be able to leave?"

"I can't say for sure right now. But she’ll need to be on that IV for at least twenty-four hours. She's severely dehydrated, among a host of other issues.”

“What does that mean?”

“It happens sometimes, mostly to first-time mothers or those with a genetic disposition, meaning a history in the family. HG seem to have a connection to human chorionic gonadotropin. This is a hormone created during pregnancy by the placenta. The body produces a large amount of this hormone at a rapid rate early in pregnancy and these levels can continue to rise throughout the pregnancy. An ultrasound might be necessary to find out if Ms. Montgomery is pregnant with twins or if there’s any problems with the baby.”

The unspoken end to his sentence set Addison's heart to ice.

She hopes they'll let her have the ultrasound. She looks to the guard who looks back at her.

“Okay. What're you going to do?”

The doctor pinches up her skin and watches as it tents and fall back into place slowly. He takes stock of her eyes, then of her mouth where she bares her teeth at him.

“How long has she been this way?”

The guard shrugs, “I don't know. I was just told an inmate needed transport” she says.

"Eighteen days." Addison says, weakly, deciding to answer the question for herself. The doctor looks at her with wide fearful eyes as though he's shocked that she could speak.

“Oh goodness, okay. She should have been brought here on the third day. Has she been eating?” the doctor asks, directing his question back at the guard again.

Addison already feels as if she's failed as a mother. All she asks is to be treated fairly. But in their eyes, she's not even human.

"Hello," she sings, "Am I invisible? The last time I checked, I was the patient. It only makes sense that you ask me the question and not -" she looks towards the officer's badge, "Officer McKenna."

"You know what, you're right, Montgomery. Go ahead." Officer McKenna tells her.

“Well, no. Of course not. I keep throwing everything back up. Water. Crackers. Prison slop. Even when I'm dry and hungry and nothing comes up but bile anymore.” she says, voice hoarse as her fists clenches and the air around them speeds up.

“There are things we can do. But for now, we will be giving you promezathine. An antiemetic which will help with the nausea. And once you're discharged, try eating smaller, more frequent meals and dry foods, such as crackers. Drink plenty of fluids to stay hydrated. We'll also give you an anti-nausea to take back to the prison,” he trails off and looks uncomfortable then clears his throat, “Or the most drastic would be to induce delivery and your symptoms would resolve after the -”

"What!" Both McKenna and her exclaims, taken aback by the doctor's suggestion, who jumps back.

“No.” Addison struggles to sit up, she can feel tears stinging her eyes, and she puts a protective hand over her stomach. “No. No. No. I will not do that to my baby.”

“You heard her.”

* * *

> _**July 17th,** _

Sometimes, she thinks her whole existence is a bad fucking nightmare.

Nightmare after nightmare after nightmare.

There's a CO with her everywhere she goes _(it's not like she can go anywhere, really)_ and at every second of the day. Even here, she doesn't pee alone.

She hadn't properly seen her face since she got here and when she sees that they've got a real mirror in the bathroom, she takes a peek at the reflection and gasps softly at what she sees.

The guards back at the prison had left thick purple bruises all around her cheeks and jaw from when they force fed her, and it's only then that she realises the stinging feel when she breathes and swallows are from the new signature they have placed upon her flesh.

She looks so drained of life and yet overflowing with it, somehow. Still, every pound that seemed to be stripping from her cheeks and chest appears to be pooling around her abdomen as the baby grows more and more.

She'd say she looks bloated, pregnant. And that could just be due to the IV sticking into her veins. But she's tall, so she wouldn't probably 'show' and look visibly pregnant up until later.

* * *

> _**July 18th,** _

She has been in the hospital for four days so far, handcuffed to the bed _(all day long with the exception of going to the bathroom and the couple of times the COs were nice enough to allow her to stretch her legs and walk around the room)_ with an officer present at all times and never leaving the room. The doctors don't talk to her at all but through the officers instead. She does not fight on it, lets it be instead, because honestly, this is a treat, almost like a vacation, to be honest. And she's soaking up ever second of it.

Granted, she almost died getting here and may be stuck in a room but she'd rather be stuck in this room than that in solitary.

*** * ***

Every meal here is a simple broth, bread and a jello cup, picked with care to try and keep her from seeing it twice. From prison stale and expired slop to hospital food, this is basically a gourmet meal.

The first day yielded little in result and Addison continued to vomit up whatever it was in her stomach she had attempted to eat. The medication they had her on made little to no difference. The second day was better. She was able to drink and eat the broth and jello a little. The doctors had decided to up her dosage. The third, even better and by the fourth she had devoured breakfast, lunch _(so far)_ and still wanted more food.

She hadn't eaten anything for over two weeks and was making up for it.

Officer McKenna comes back today, just when Addison thought she'd never see the kind CO again, and when she sees her changing shifts with the officer who's been giving her a hard time all afternoon for having to go to the bathroom, she can't help the smile forming on her face.

"Well, you look a lot better," Officer McKenna says, nodding, genuinely impressed at her progress.

The drugs they gave her was a lifesaver and she's now able to eat without throwing up. She's still slightly nauseated from time to time, but nothing so pressing yet.

"Brought you a sandwich and a chocolate bar," she says and hands her the paper bag, "The broth and jello is good but it's not gonna put any fat back in you."

"Oh, thank you," Addison says, genuinely thankful and almost in tears because this is the first act of kindness she's felt in weeks.

There still are some good COs, after all.

_How do you thank someone who's been treating you like a human being?_

"Don't you mention it, Montgomery."

Her stomach rolls when she takes the sandwich out and Addison has never see anything more delicious. She can't remember the last time she's had a grilled cheese sandwich. It's still small and tight, her stomach, but she stuffs her face until her stomach is burning and she feels ill, but the sensation of fullness is alien and so very good.

It tastes homey. It tastes delicious. It tastes like the food she used to make for herself.

"Is it any good?"

She realises that she are crying. Her face feels hot and wet, her skin too tight, and when she takes a deep gasping breath, it burns her lungs like the air is frigid. She nods and continues eating frantically, before her body decides it is too much food and rebels.

Officer McKenna sees her, of course, seems to understand the reason behind the tears; she doesn't mention it.

“You should eat more slowly,” she says, and she does.

She watches her eat and Addison has to physically restrain herself from licking her fingers.

She remembers prison, how bitter everything tasted, how the psychiatrist would mock her, how the COs had strapped her, held her down and shoved food down her throat, how she saw the doctor watching it, liked watching her struggle.

She thinks about refusing medication and making a fuss so, she can be sick again and stay here longer.

She doesn't do any of that, but instead, she keeps the vomit down. She keeps eating. And just like SHU, she sleeps throughout the day, mostly.

*** * ***

Most people don't bother to introduce themselves, they come with food and medication and she takes them. And she opens her mouth when they tell her to.

"Can I have that newspaper, please?" she asks the CO on duty one morning after breakfast, "I'm bored out of my mind here."

"No."

"At least just give me the puzzle section."

He eyes her suspiciously before groaning and reluctantly handing it to her.

"Can I have a pen, too? I like to do the sudoku," she says, sweetly before adding, "Please."

He gives her his pen and she thanks him with a big smile.

Addison thinks of Derek as she does the sudoku _(he doesn’t know that she's in the hospital, no one does)_ and how they used to do the puzzles in the newspapers together and how she had let him down, instead. She saw him in court in arraignment last week. He was at the back with her parents and she pretended like she hadn't seen them.

Eight more months has been added to her sentence. She had ruined everything by giving those girls what they wanted. She had only three years and that is nothing when facing life.

They want to see her rot in prison with them.

* * *

> **_July 19th,_ **

Addison sits in a wheelchair, staring straight ahead, and not at the people gawking at her, as the nurse pushes her through the hall. Thankfully, there aren't that many people at this time of the night _(something about security risk and safety, blah blah blah - she's a prisoner)_ but she's very well aware that she sticks out like a sore thumb.

There are COs right behind her and she's in an orange uniform and handcuffs and ankle shackles - really, _how can she not?_

When she's at the OBGYN floor of the hospital, they bring her to a room where she is once again out of the shackles and instead handcuffed to the bed. Her IV is attached to the bed and she watches the bag, the steady drip drip drip as it sways lightly with her jittery, nervous movements.

She has no idea what's in store for her in the next few minutes, what they’ll see, what they’ll find. Throwing up as much as she did, without keeping anything in for more than just a few hours, she is anxious that the baby hadn't gotten enough nutrients.

Her fears that had clutched her heart when she first learned of the baby threatened to return, the gentle but sharp scrape at the edge of her mind. Just because there’s a heartbeat doesn’t mean everything is okay, doesn’t mean she hasn’t screwed everything up, that she isn’t about to put herself through a whole lot of pain.

_What if … what if something goes wrong again? What if the scan shows there’s something wrong with the baby? What if she's not ready? What if Derek isn't? What if he doesn't want to take their baby? What if Bizzy doesn't want to take it either? What the hell is she going to do? Foster care?_

She's never going to get her baby back, then. She's heard horror stories from the women at prison; they'd all said that it was impossible.

Her child. Her baby. Every time she thinks about what's going to happen in six months, her heart does a flip and her stomach churns.

They are having a baby at the worst possible time.

She can't keep thinking like this, can't let that ugly voice take control of her thoughts. That's what got her to solitary confinement, at the first place.

“Ms. Montgomery?”

She looks up, sees a doctor look up from his clipboard, then, at the COs next to her.

"Is that really necessary, Officer?" he asks, pointing at cuffs around her wrist, "There's you here, one outside. She's certainly not going anywhere."

"It's standard protocol," the officer says, dryly, "Montgomery is still a dangerous criminal at the end of the day."

That stings, she thinks as she watches the interaction. She would like to tell the doctor to not bother and waste his time because they're not budging in the slightest.

"Well, then, Ms. Montgomery, I'm Doctor Langdon, how are you feeling? I heard that you've been admitted for hyperemesis gravidarum."

"Ahh - yeah," she stutters. It feels weird to be talking to someone, "I'm feeling much better. Thank you very much."

"Is this your first?"

She nods.

"That's wonderful."

"Your first scan as well?"

The doctor seems nice _(the first medical staff so far to treat her like a human being, so that's refreshing)_ , if not a little bit nervous with his chatter being an indication. She guesses he doesn’t work much with prisoners but refrains from teasing him and making him more nervous. Addison isn’t comfortable with being here either, so she has to keep herself in check.

"I’m sure you’re already a bundle of nerves waiting to see your baby.”

_Her baby._

Addison's heart flips again. The ultrasound is actually going to show her a baby. _Oh, God._ A tiny version of them. And that thought terrifies her. She's going to see her baby – their baby – for the first time ever. She takes a deep breath and wills to calm down. All of these monitors and machines are here to check if the baby has been growing steadily, healthily.

The doctor shoots her a sideways glance as he begins to prepare the equipments, smiling at her. “You look like you're about to be sick.”

Addison blushes. “No. No. I'm fine."

_God, she hopes._

"If you do feel sick, don't hesitate to tell me. Everything’s going to be, alright? Would you feel calmer if I talked you through what we’re looking for today?"

She nods.

"Okay," he says. "Lift up your shirt, please."

She does and watches as the doctor grab a bottle from the counter and shakes it, tucking a couple of paper towels under her waistband. “Now, the first thing we need to do is put some of this gel on your stomach. It might be a little cold.”

He squirts blue gel all over her lower abdomen, she gasps a little at the cold contact.

“Okay, Ms. Montgomery, I’m going to press down on your tummy with the probe. It won’t hurt, but you might feel a little uncomfortable as I move along your pelvic line. Just tell me if you need to stop for a minute, alright?”

Addison nods, her large eyes already fixed on the large monitor next to her head. A triangular segment takes up the centre of the screen, a blurry grey image against a black background. She glances at the fuzzy image on the screen and the probe in the doctor's hand as he presses it down onto her mostly-flat stomach.

It takes a good couple of minutes of twisting around, much to Addison's discomfort, for them to finally get a clear image.

“Okay,” he says quietly, still clicking furiously on the mouse as he runs the probe up and down her stomach and then back and forth, spreading the sticky gel over her skin, “Everything is looking great so far.”

“Really?”

The doctor nods and smiles warmly. “Yes. The baby looks normal, growing at a steady rate.”

She turns back to the screen as an image begins to appear. At first she can't quite make out what she is looking at. It looks like a mass of black blobs on a grey background.

The doctor seems to notice her frown and clicks on a section of the screen. “You see this curve here?” he gestures to the screen with a finger, “This is the baby’s spine. Looks like they’re sitting comfortably.”

The officer in the room with her now has his attention at the monitor as well, watching as the black and white static slowly becomes something recognisable. She holds her breath, squeezing her hand into a ball far harder than she intends. But she doesn't care right now, she's far too focused on the grey, fuzzy blob that suddenly looks like a —

It’s a baby.

Her baby. Their baby.

Addison lets out a breath she didn't know she was holding, as she keeps her eyes solely on the monitor. The baby is comfortable. Safe. She begins to relax, allowing herself to smile a little and finally enjoy this moment.

"That's my baby."

There’s a head and a nose and a chin. It’s got thin little legs and tiny little feet. She has no idea where the development should be at this point but she can see faint little dots where the toes are either going to be or are already growing.

Their baby is growing inside of her, with a mouth and hands and a brain. They did this, Derek and her; they made this life. And it’s there, right on the screen.

 _Alive_.

It's all too real. And she now feels guilty and awful for ever wanting to get rid of it.

“How far along is it?” she asks, after a while of silence.

The doctor pushes a button on the massive equipment and the image freezes for a moment. He fiddles a bit and a few measurement lines shows up here and there, taking image after image while humming in thought. It still seems surreal, as he continues to move the wand about, getting as many angles as he can, pushing buttons to make sure he captures it all.

“So, based on size and development, it looks like you're around 14-15 weeks.”

That ... that seems about right. She blinks, trying to mentally go back through what she'd been doing for the past three entire months.

_Surviving prison._

"It's so tiny,” Addison whispers absentmindedly. She has her eyes fixed on the monitor, staring in awe at the frozen image of a tiny bright circle in a sea of darkness.

Then, the machine next to the monitor begins to make a loud humming sound. Her soft gasp is barely audible against the whooshing filling the entire room.

_Whump whump whump whump whump whump._

She feels another lump rise in her throat. “That's the heartbeat.” she says, looking eagerly back at the fuzzy screen again.

"Yes. That is the heartbeat and …" he suddenly falls silent for a moment, looking so serious and distracted that Addison feels all the blood leave her face, her palms starts sweating and her breathing increases.

"What? What is it?"

_This is it. Something is wrong. Something is incredibly wrong._

"Is the baby okay? What's happening?"

Addison gazes at the monitor, desperately trying to make anything out of the vague shapes as the doctor moves the wand over her belly again. Her eyes shining with threatening tears.

"Yes. Yes. The baby is okay. But there seems to be another heartbeat."

"What?"

"You’re having twins."

And that's when her breathing stops completely. Everything goes hazy for a minute. She could dimly hear the doctor explaining how this could explain her excessive sickness, but really, all she could think about is ... _twins?_

_Twins._

All she could think of is how Derek doesn't even know she's pregnant and how he's even going to take the news.

 _Twins? If he even wants them?_ They've never even talked about wanting kids. _And with him in medical school? And twins? Where will they get the money?_ Because his part-time job as a server will not even be enough to cover one bab _y. She suppose she could get a loan from her parents. What if ... ? What she's better off giving them to her parents._

"Can you hold your breath for me?"

Funny. Because she thought she'd been doing just that these last few minutes. But she does as she's told. Always the good little soldier. As she holds her breath, the image on the screen stills and the doctor points towards a small white speck.

"That is the first baby. The one we've met already," his hand moves to a another blob, "And this is the second. This one's been hiding."

Addison lets out a wet, shuddering laugh as a fat tear rolls down her cheek. Her free hand comes up to wipe at her eyes as tears fall.

Stupid hormones.

A smile split open her face. Their whole lives are about to change.

She is barely aware of the doctor cleaning off the gel, sparing her only a short glance. "Are they healthy?"

"They are as healthy as they can be. A bit small, but, considering the circumstances, I don’t see anything that raises any red flags. Everything is progressing as expected. No abnormalities, nothing that would indicate any placental problems. We’ll pass the scans on to the prison and have them give you an official due date, though I can tell you you’re looking at early January. However the chances of premature delivery are high with multiples ..."

Her happiness feels like a bubble surrounding her. Nothing can hurt her today. Not the hospital staff. Not the COs.

She thinks of her babies, and of Derek, and more tears stream down her face.

She hasn't a clue as to what she's going to do.

Prison and the officers can't take this away from her. She'll finish her time in SHU, join all the programmes and classes offered by the prison, get another 'job' if she can, so she can get her 'good time' and get out early. And once she gets out of prison, she'll be with her babies again.

Forever, this time.

There are two small white blurs on the sonogram picture, almost recognisable as tiny humans, and to Addison, they are already her entire world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: I have a twin, like Addison’s foetuses.

**Author's Note:**

> No, I have never gone to prison.


End file.
